Blizzard
by cheekyrox
Summary: It is the role of a Guardian to protect the children of the world-their hopes, dreams, memories, and wonder-and also to protect one another from whatever enemies might arise. But when the greatest danger to your friends is yourself, that job gets a whole lot harder.
1. Prologue: Shadows in the Snow

**A/N: What...what am I even doing? There are so many things I should be doing, and this is definitely NOT one of them. Truth be told I'm actually a bit daunted about posting anything in a fandom that is already so big when the movie isn't even out in most countries, but, hey, I never said I looked before I leap. This is actually the most canonical work of fanfiction I have attempted so far, but that doesn't mean everything I write is not going to contradict canon. I have not read the books (working on that) and am using my own interpretation for a good deal of movie. Do NOT sue me. I am applying a read at your own risk notice to this thing, but feel free to drop me a line (good or bad) and let me know what you think.  
**

**Oh, and I DO NOT OWN, though I'm really not sure why those things are necessary.  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox.  
**

**SPOILERS*SPOILERS*SPOILERS*SPOILERS*SPOILERS*SPOILERS...Get the picture?  
**

**Prologue**

**-Shadows in the Snow-**

Jack Frost.

Two, simple words. A title. A _name_.

For the longest time they had been the only possession their owner had. The title the only thing he could truly claim for his own. When a name was all you could remember, all you _knew_, it became something far more important than most would think it _could_ be. The name Jack Frost had been a blank slate when he first awakened beneath that icy lake, a canvas ready for the painting, and he had been the artist to determine what colors would cover it. He had had no one to advise him, no one to dictate what shape his creation should adopt, and so he had shaped himself according to his own feelings. He had built an entity around the name of Jack Frost, slowly discovering _who_ he was as he did so, and presenting each discovery proudly to a world that he sometimes believed would _never_ see him. No one had offered to help. No one had outstretched a hand of guidance. Few even bothered to speak to him, and those that did would look upon the person he had created for himself, the person he _believed_ himself to be, and saw anything and everything but what he _wanted_ them to see.

Jack was well aware he had a reputation among the other immortals for a great many things, and very few that reflected well upon him. He was a troublemaker to most. Irresponsible. Selfish. Disrespectful. Disruptive. He knew each and every label that came attached to his name, springing to life in the minds of those who actually _knew _who he was as soon as he was mentioned. He knew what they thought. What they said behind his back and thought he didn't know about. It never ceased to amaze him that they could conclude so much about his character, and yet never come close to touching upon the truth.

He didn't deny that he had a habit of breaking rules, both written and merely understood. That was probably one of the few things others believed about him that was actually _true_. As for the rest, well…the kinder characteristics attributed to his name, a considerably shorter list than the other, included playful, cheerful, and carefree. It was a sad reminder of how little his fellows actually knew him that most of those were as false as their less favourable counterparts.

Jack _was_ playful. It was in his nature, a part of his centre, a way to spread fun among the children he had so recently sworn to protect, but who, in reality, had lived beneath his watchful eye for much longer. He had always enjoyed the games invented by both himself and others, and he had never shied away from playing alongside those who did not even recognize his presence. He _was_ playful, they had gotten that part right at least, but as for the rest?

Jack's newly uncovered memories told him that he had once been a cheerful person, a long time ago when his family and friends had been _more_ than just a memory. He had been happy in almost every recollection now restored to him, swelling with the emotion and swamped with so much contentment it had been overpoweringly bittersweet to taste it again. That constant good cheer had not carried through into his second life. He smiled often, the gesture so practiced, perhaps even _remembered_, that it came naturally as a means of masking his true feelings, and very rarely as a genuine gesture. He had thrown himself into his work that others called play because it was the only thing he knew, and he had spent _every day_ of his three hundred years trying to make someone, _anyone _see him.

Regardless of what anyone believed of him, it had not been a happy existence, and he had _fought_ each day to keep his smile in place. To pretend that every rejection, every stare that passed right through him did not stab over and over in a place that had never healed. He hadn't always succeeded, despite his best efforts, as Bunny and several others treated to a display of his less positive feelings could attest, but he had _tried_, a great deal harder than they knew. Nevertheless, he had never been _cheerful_, instead taking joy in his work as it lasted and seeking comfort however he was able in the few hours of stillness that inevitably came when he was left with nothing to do but sit and consider how solitary his life was.

He sometimes wondered if the others knew how many bitter tears had been shed over his isolation, but always dismissed the idea, because if they had _known_ they would never have called him carefree.

It was a poorly drawn conclusion at best to assume that just because he liked to act in a more juvenile manner than some would like that he didn't have a care in the world. If anything, it was the exact opposite. He acted the way he did to _forget_ those cares. To pretend they didn't _exist_. A snow day was the perfect opportunity to focus his mind away from the unexpectedly dark corners he knew leisure could uncover in the back of his mind. A blizzard allowed him to vent his emotions without having to think about _why_ he was feeling the way he was. A trip around the world, spreading frost patterns and causing havoc was an escape when the familiar that _wasn't_ familiar began to gnaw at the back of his mind. Jack had a great many cares all of his own, he just refused to let them turn him into someone who _couldn't_ see the fun in life.

And all his waiting, all those bitter, lonely hours and desperate, outlandish attempts to gain even the barest scrap of attention had finally paid off. He was a Guardian now. Officially. Sworn in and irreversibly attached to the title, if North's proclamation was to believed. He had his memories back, a family he could now _remember_, a purpose clearly spelt out at long last. He had _friends_, people he could talk to without being instantly dismissed as the troublemaker, even if he did only see them sporadically. He had _believers_, a slowly growing and expanding number of children who finally recognized the artist behind the work they had enjoyed for centuries. It was, to say the least, a little overwhelming, and Jack had been surprised to find himself _deliberately_ seeking solitude when it all became just a little too much.

He had spent three hundred years begging for someone to see him, and now that they could he had no idea how to deal with being in the spotlight.

If he had been the person his reputation painted him to be, he would have lapped up the attention and allowed it to fuel his ego into something dangerously large, but he _wasn't_, no matter what anyone said, and sometimes he was horrified to find himself wishing he was invisible again, just so he could do something without being seen to be the one doing it. Outside of Burgess that was a much easier goal to accomplish than inside of it, but even as he found himself baulking at the many pairs of eyes suddenly able to comprehend his existence, he was also terrified of straying too far from those who now believed, lest he return to find himself forgotten.

It was frustrating to find himself tied to the place by his own insecurities and fears, and sometimes he took off for days at a time just to prove to himself that he _could_. Those weeks spent away were never worth the repercussion of returning, however, and finding his hands trembling where they clutched his staff for fear of being invisible as he landed in Jamie's yard was never quite worth the brief euphoric sense of freedom. Sometimes he felt like one of Bunny's boomerangs, bouncing back and forth between such a range of emotions, and it wasn't an entirely pleasant experience.

He hadn't told any of the others that he was struggling with this. It seemed silly to complain about suddenly having everything you had ever wanted or dreamed of, and the other Guardians were busy in a way he would never be regardless. Even with Easter over and done with, Bunny was busy planning for next year, determined to make it the best celebration of the holiday yet to make up for this year's catastrophe. North was preoccupied with Christmas, and all the preparations that had been put on hold in the face of the threat Pitch had brought to their doorstep. Sandy and Tooth never stopped working, and he wouldn't have been able to get a word in with one of them a lot of the time whilst the other couldn't have given him verbal advice even if he had any to offer.

From time to time he tried to imagine what the separate reactions of the Four would be if they knew how terrified he was of imposing upon their time and making a nuisance of himself. He was a little surprised himself at his own sudden reluctance to cause trouble, though, not wanting to intrude in his fellow Guardians' work certainly didn't mean he had any intention of stopping his yearly tradition of sprinkling snow over as many egg hunts as possible.

So maybe he _had_ earned the label of troublemaker, his argument against the others still stood.

Nevertheless, Easter was over for now, and with Spring in Burgess in full swing Jack's sudden disinclination to leave was more than just a little disconcerting. He shouldn't _want_ to be where the weather was warmer, and yet he did, for reasons that were both entirely unexplainable and absolutely clear at the same time. Confused, happy yet simultaneously miserable, and knowing full well that he needed to clear his head before the next scheduled gathering at the North Pole, which would doubtlessly come with a fair number of uncomfortable questions if he didn't sort himself out prior to the event, Jack had eventually found his way to the snow-ridden southern regions that never failed to provide a safe, blank canvas for his venting. They were a haven where he could soar through the air, letting the wind twist and twirl him as he tossed snow flurries and frost bursts around without fear of repercussions. This was as much _his_ hideout as any of the other Guardians' sanctuaries, a safe place he had only once failed to find comforting, and that was more due to _who_ he had been sharing the crisp air with than the location itself.

By the time he was done with his graceful, lethal dance across the heavens the sharp peaks below him were covered in several additional layers of snow, with more to come once the winds whipping ice through the air settled and allowed the last flakes to fall. Spent, comfortably exhausted, and enjoying the peace that never failed to follow the cathartic exercise, he settled upon the highest summit, perched atop his repaired staff to better view his work. The blanket of white was as soothing as it had ever been, and he stretched out a hand to catch the snowflakes raining down around him on his palm, each one just a little different, special by design.

His newfound sense of peace was not to last, however, though this time the disruption of his equilibrium did not come from his own conflicting feelings, but rather from an outside, and wholly unexpected, source.

"Frustrated, Jack?"

The oily, smooth tone was entirely too familiar, and he startled, almost tumbling from his staff as he leapt to solid ground, grasping the wooden handle firmly as he swung about, searching for the Nightmare King with his eyes. There was nothing to see, however, save for the white whirlwind he himself had created, and he straightened from his battle-ready stance with a confused scowl.

"You did not really think my own fearlings posed a threat to _me_ now, did you?"

The words, strung together in a sentence and pronounced with such malicious deliberation, should have been more alarming than they were. In all honesty, their impact probably _would _have been a great deal more profound, had the vehement cloud of black sand that came out of nowhere not eclipsed their sudden and unexpected appearance. He didn't even have time to so much as cry out before it had swatted him from the mountaintop to the valley floor below with the ruthlessness with which a fly swatter pins its helpless victim. One moment he was standing as far atop the world as he could manage, any cares that might once have rested on his shoulders stripped away by the breeze, and the next he was on the ground miles upon miles below, a puff of white powder drifting all around him and his back aching from the abruptness of its connection with the snow-covered soil.

He gasped loudly, winded and shocked at the sudden abortion of his former position, but still retained presence of mind enough to tighten his hold on the staff that had miraculously remained by his side throughout his sudden and unexpected flight, his senses alert to a perceived threat, even if his thoughts were not quite swift enough to connect instinct with recognition and reaction. It was that simple act of closing his fingers that insured the treasured item remained in his grasp as he was suddenly aloft again, something cold and cruelly tight closed around his ankle like a vice and allowing him only to climb so high before wrenching him back down to earth.

"I _staged_ my defeat, and you were all so arrogant, so conceited, that you _believed_ you had actually _beaten_ me!"

He landed on his side this time, and rolled, the snow that had ever been his ally clouding his vision as he struggled to halt his ongoing progress down the incline. Gravity and his own inability to haul his thoughts together worked against him, and he halted only at the bottom, where his headlong spill crashed him neatly into a pair of legs that remained unmoving as he rebounded off their unforgiving surface. Lying on his back he blinked dazedly up into yellow eyes, and was finally given the opportunity to offer some form of response.

"Pitch?"

"Hello, Jack." The greeting was courteous, tinged with a note of warm regard such as one might expect at a reunion between old and close friends. "You should know better than to travel alone. _Unprotected_."

It was a small enough warning, but enough for him to roll clear of the heel that would otherwise have made a home in his stomach. Turning his sidewards momentum into a neat head-over-heels motion he was on his feet in seconds, calling the wind to his side as he pushed off in an attempt to gain some distance. He barely made it two feet into the air before the dark sand closed around his waist and pulled him back down to slam into solid ground a third time. He could feel the gritty substance swirling all around him, relishing his alarm, and wrenching his staff from his hands with enough force as to nearly tear his arm from its socket.

"No!"

He grappled against the shadowy darkness, striking out against everything and nothing. His fingers missed the familiar wooden surface by mere inches as a hand-an _enemy_-more substantial than the black sand slowly drawing back and away from him across the snow-laden hillside lifted the rod out of his reach.

"Give it _back_, Pitch."

The threat in his words was decidedly empty, but Jack Frost had never been one to back down in the face of a bully, and he wasn't going to start now, with someone he had already _beaten. _Scrabbling to his feet again he glared at the shadowy figure of his enemy, waiting for an opportunity to seize back his weapon.

"It _is_ strange, don't you think?" the Nightmare King allowed, utterly ignoring the seething, immortal teenager before him. "That your powers should be so intricately tied to this…this _stick_. I mean, the other Guardians are armed, certainly, but I do not see a single one them so _reliant_ on their weapons for power."

"_Give it back_!" Jack made a swipe for the staff, but Pitch merely sidestepped neatly, holding the item overhead as he grinned wickedly.

"Some might say it is just a quirk, something else just a little special about the Guardian of Fun," Pitch continued smugly. "But we both know it's more than that, don't we?" Pitch took a step forward, and without thought, without time to consider whether or not it made him seem afraid, Jack took a step away, warily keeping a steady distance between his disadvantaged self and his opponent. "It is a weakness, wouldn't you say, Frost?"

Quirking a smile, he replied without hesitation, "The only weakness I see here is your need to gloat, Pitch. Don't you remember what happened last time you tried to monologue? And there _is_ plenty of ammunition around here, staff or no."

"Oh, I remember," Pitch's voice had grown lower as he spoke, and now, as he reached the pinnacle of his performance, his dark sands swarmed around him, blotting out the moonlight that had found its way through breaks in the clouds above. "The question is, Frost, do _you_ remember what happened the last time I held this mere twig in my hands? Do you remember how much it _hurt_?"

"Don't…!"

His own strangled cry cut short what was half-plea and half-demand as Pitch snapped the staff in two with the same ease as he had the first time around. And, just as it had been before, Jack _felt_ that snap within his own body; a terrible, gut-wrenching pain that had his hands instinctively encircling his stomach as his vision momentarily blurred and his lungs refused to draw in breath.

"You put the pieces together last time, Jack," Pitch taunted, and blinking back the tears of pain that threatened to fall the winter spirit found his gaze transfixed by the two halves now twirling in the Nightmare King's hands. "Let's see you do it again, shall we? But we can't make it so easy for you…"

He had only one, horrified second to realize what Pitch intended to do, and it wasn't enough. To brace himself. To _stop_ Pitch. To do _anything_. The second fracture sounded as loudly in his ears as the first, and he found himself on his knees as the pain inside of him redoubled, a fiery inferno that threatened to destroy him just as surely as the sun melted away his own creations. He did not even have time to breathe before a third crack split the silence, his own agonized scream drowning out the initial sound as he doubled over in pain.

"It didn't have to end this way, Jack!" Pitch echoed his own words with two more loud snaps, and Jack found himself suddenly sprawled on his back, unable to stop himself from writhing in a frantic, and ultimately fruitless, attempt to stop the pain. He kept one arm wrapped around his torso, trying to hold himself together because it felt like he was being _ripped_ apart, whilst the other groped blindly for something to hold onto, his fingers closing over only snow that fell through his fingers. "We could have ruled this world _together_. We could have _ended_ the Guardians!"

Three more horrendous cracks and he wasn't screaming anymore because he _couldn't_.

"All you had to do was step off that high horse of yours," the Nightmare King continued, sounding for all the world as if _Jack_ was the one being unreasonable here.

_Snap_.

"I offered you an opportunity you should have been _begging_ me for!"

_Snap. _

_Snap._

"Well, _beg_ now, Jack. Beg for _mercy_."

_Snap._

_Snap._

_Snap._

Pitch was still talking, but the words were indistinguishable, lost in the horrible ringing in his ears and the fiery pain he _could not escape_. He was vaguely aware of the need to breathe, and the fact that his gasping inhalations were doing nothing to ease his agony, but he had no control anymore. Everything faded, and he had no way of knowing for how long he remained drifting in a place that consisted only of pain, but when he found the strength to pry his eyes open again, just two tiny slits of light in a world that had grown suddenly dark, Pitch was still there, towering over him with a cruel smile of triumph on his dark face.

"Let's see you put the pieces back together now, Frost," the Nightmare King gloated, raising his hands and letting the remains of Jack's staff, so _many_ little pieces, rain down upon the prone winter spirit. For a moment, then, just the briefest of moments, there was a look of near remorse on the dark spirit's face as he sighed.

"You should have taken what was offered, Jack," Pitch murmured with a shake of his head. "Now, you have nothing."

**A.N 2: I suppose I should have tacked this one the post when I first put it up, but, heh, better late than never. I'm expecting to update this story about once a week, so the next update should be up around 7:00 pm NZ time on Sunday. There is a possibility I will post earlier, but so long as my buffer of chapters still remains and nothing untoward happens I will not post _later_.**


	2. Chapter 1: Kangaroo to the Rescue

**A/N: Sooo, I relented, and decided to post another chapter this week. I haven't really eaten into my buffer at all seeing as I've written another chapter since I posted the first, so I should be alright I think.**

**I'd like to give a shout-out to to all those who followed, favorited, and reviewed. I'd list you by name but it would make for an incredibly large author's note and you lovely people all know who you are anyway. :-)  
**

**A special thanks to whoever submitted this story for consideration in the Tumblr ROTG Fanfic recommendations, and to Reidluver, for accepting it for the same. You guys are awesome.  
**

**As a final note, I received a couple of reviews/pms saying how 'in character' I had kept the characters. Here's to sincerely hoping I can continue to do so.  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 1**

**-Kangaroo to the Rescue**

_It was a sound he would never forget. That horrible creak and groan, followed by the distinct, crackling boom as the ice beneath his-_their_-feet rent itself a part. His eyes shot downward of their own accord, seeking, seeking, seeking, and horror rushed through him when he realized it was not his weight the ice was refusing to hold. _

_It was _hers_._

_That single realization froze him in his tracks, and he just stood there a moment, paralyzed by fear, his heart pounding against his ribcage to a distinct staccato rhythm. A thousand denials sprung to mind, the thought that the ice was always safe by this late in the season, that it could not now be failing them. He felt the uncertainty, the sheer panic of not knowing what to do. But then he looked up. Then he saw the stark terror in his sister's dark eyes, and…something else. Something far more powerful._

_Trust. _

_Trust in _him_. _

_In his ability to save her and protect her as he always had and always would._

_All it took was that one look, and then he was reaching down to unbuckle his skates, his eyes never leaving the frightened brown eyes of his sibling. They were alone out here, with no help within calling distance and any search hours away yet. It was up to him to save her, and he was determined not to fail._

_"It's okay. It's okay," he told her, his voice soothing, gentle, and calm. "Don't look down. Just look at me."_

_"Jack, I-I'm scared!" Her voice was shrill with terror and the sound pierced his heart with icy shards of fear. He smiled anyway, reassuringly, determined not to show her anything but certainty._

_"I know, I know," he answered softly, ignoring the threatening crack of the ice beneath his feet. "But you're gonna be alright. You're not going to fall in. Uh…" His eyes darted frantically, searching for a way out, and alighting on the shepherd's crook resting a mere few feet away on the ice. Hope stirred to life inside his chest, and he looked towards her with another gentle smile. "We're going to have a little fun instead."_

_His words failed to have the calming effect he had hoped for, however, and there were tears in her eyes as she answered. _

_"No! We're not!"_

_Forcing a grin, he tried again, "Would I trick you?"_

_"Yes!" she declared adamantly. "You always play tricks!"_

"_Oh, alright." He chuckled, not even his fear quite able to dampen the amusement that entirely too truthful accusation stirred inside of him. "Well, not this time. I promise. I _promise_ you're gonna be…you're gonna be fine." Oh, how he hoped that was true! He had never lied to his sister, _never_, and he did not intend to start now. "You have to believe in me."_

_The look in her eyes was still frightened, but that fear was tempered now, subdued._

"_You wanna play a game?" he offered brightly, keeping his smile firmly pinned to his face as he took his eyes off her, just for a second, to study the ice around him. "We're gonna play hopscotch." He glanced back at her, and gratefully took note of the fact her focus was no longer on the ice beneath her feet. Straightening slightly, he widened his grin. "Like we play every day. It's as easy as _one…_" The ice gave a horrendous snap beneath his foot, but he placed his weight down anyway, almost losing his balance and letting loose a playful cry of alarm that set the frightened girl giggling. "Two." Nothing happened, and he covered the last of the distance with a single bound, crouching to retrieve the rod. "Three!" _

"_Alright," he whispered the word, not sure if he was talking to himself or her. "Now it's your turn." He saw the fear dance through her eyes, and he forced himself to _keep_ smiling as he extended the staff and slowly began to count. "One" She gasped as the cracks beneath her widened, the ice groaning warningly as she moved her feet, and he hastened to calm her. And himself. "That's it. That's it. _Two._" She took another tiny step, exhaling sharply as the lines beneath her feet continued to widen. But Jack ignored the ice, letting out a triumphant 'three!' as he hooked the staff about her waist and sent her spinning to safety across the frozen lake, falling back when the momentum cost him his balance._

_The two of them shared a smile as he clambered back to his feet, his sister safely sequestered away on the thicker ice by the shoreline. Triumph swelled within him, a great wealth of _pride_ for what he had just accomplished, and relief that she was _safe_. It was all gone a second later, when what had once been solid gave way beneath him, and he was falling, falling, _falling_ with a voice frantically calling his name._

"Jack?"

_He hit the icy water, his gaze flying upwards, to the sky above and the moon that…wasn't there. He searched for it frantically, for the brief comfort its silver light had provided in that cold, dark abyss, but there was nothing but shadows, and bright, yellow eyes glowing in the darkness._

"Hey!"

_Am I drowning_?

"Snap out of it!"

_No_. _Drowning doesn't feel like this._

"Jack!"

The last time someone had called his name with fear like that clouding every sound, his sister had almost died.

_But I saved her_…_didn't_ _I_? _That's why_…

His sister was dead, though. Years ago now. It probably shouldn't hurt as much as it did to know that.

_She's_ _safe. I made sure she was safe_.

That didn't stop her from dying though. Not everyone was immortal, after all.

"Frost?"

Someone touched his shoulder, just a brief brush of contact. It was enough though. Enough for him to realize his eyes were closed. Enough for him to move, just a little.

He instantly regretted it.

The pain was like a thousand stabbing needles, and it was _everywhere_. He held himself rigidly still, scarcely daring to breathe in case that made it hurt _more_.

"_Jack_!"

The raised volume was like a shout in his ear, and he flinched before he could stop himself, the low moan of pain that forced its way past his lips just as instinctual.

_That HURT_!

"That's it, mate," the voice coaxed, and there was a hand resting on his shoulder again. At least, he thought it was a hand. Except the shape was wrong and it didn't feel _right_. "Open your eyes."

He really, _really_ didn't want to, because opening his eyes right now meant acknowledging that this painful existence was more than a nightmare. More than a bad dream that would drift away the moment he was actually awake. He couldn't sleep with his eyes open. Then again, he doubted he could sleep with them closed either at this point. Grudgingly conceding that the only way to get the persistent voice and hand to _leave him alone_ was probably to do as asked, he attempted to open his eyes.

Nothing happened. Apparently his brain signals were not quite reaching the intended recipients, and it took another dozen attempts or more for him to even lever his eyelids open to the barest of chinks. The light glaring down at him from above was dazzling, and he closed them again swiftly, another groan escaping his unguarded lips.

"Sorry," the voice apologized quickly, and there was a shuffle of movement, the ground around him shifting ever so slightly as snow gave beneath weight. "Try again."

Distrustfully, he slowly obeyed, and was relieved to find something blocking the worst of the glare. He still didn't open his eyes more than a slit, fully aware the blurriness was most likely not his imagination, but he could make out a vague outline that strung a note of familiarity in his memory. It mingled with the accented voice in his ears and the strangely shaped appendage resting on his shoulder to create a semi-recognisable image in the back of his mind, and it finally registered that he _knew_ this person.

"You with me, mate?"

And _that_ voice, he concluded distantly, was _not_ supposed to point in _his_ direction with concern. It disturbed him slightly that the emotion behind the words was so unmistakable. He couldn't even _pretend_ he'd heard something else.

"Bunny…?" He would have said more, made a teasing joke such as that he had flung in the Easter Kangaroo's face when he pretended to fall from the sleigh, except his voice came out all rasping and wrong and _I don't sound like _that_!_

The fuzzy, grey silhouette blocking the sun gave a snort. "Well, I'm not a Kangaroo, that's for sure."

He huffed a laugh, or _tried_ to, but what came out of his mouth sounded more like the gasping, dying exhalations of a fish removed from water.

And he had thought the situation couldn't get any more humiliating.

"Hey now, keep your eyes _open_."

Startled, because he hadn't even realized they were _closed_, he blinked sharply, daring to pry his eyelids apart a little wider, though the blurriness did not ease with the larger field of vision. He supposed he should be thankful for that, because there was no way he could accurately assess the features of the Pooka when the only distinguishable thing above him was a grey blob.

"What're you doin' here?" His voice came out slurred this time, barely understandable even to himself, but he persisted anyway, because Bunny hadn't said anything and the silence was just _awkward_. "I thought…thought…hated the cold."

Apparently, comprehensible sentences were beyond him right now, but he figured he'd get another 'A for Effort' for trying. Except North wasn't here, and he wasn't fighting Pitch…

_Pitch_.

His breaths quickened as the memories came flooding back, and the hand still resting on his stomach jerked reflexively, brushing along the sharpened edges of wood torn asunder.

_My staff!_

He tried to sit up, desperate to see what damage had been done to his beloved shepherd's crook, the one constant companion he had had in his three hundred years. But all his mental efforts earned him was a vehement rebuke from his own body as his blurry vision abruptly spiralled away in a huff and his back hit the cool snow after raising itself no more than an inch off the white surface. It took several long moments for the black spots before his eyes to fade away, and the ringing in his ears to cease, and it was only then that he realized the towering form above him was addressing him with some fairly colourful language.

"…so lie _still_, you bloody idiot," Bunny finished his rant, and Jack was absent-mindedly grateful he had missed the majority of it.

"M'not an idiot," he muttered a token protest to the one insult he had caught, opening his eyes for the third time in far too short a period of time and enjoying the pleasurable sensation of actually being able to make out a few of the smaller details before him. Which, unfortunately, included the furry, whiskered, _scowling_ visage of his fellow Guardian. "Hey, Bunny."

"Hey yourself." Whipping his hand away suddenly now that Jack was aware enough to recognize the fact it _was_ Bunny's paw on his shoulder, the Easter Guardian folded his arms, rocking back slightly on his heels where he was crouched in the snow. "You want to tell me what happened?"

"What happened…" he repeated blankly, shifting his gaze away from the other Guardian and up towards the blue sky above. Last time he had seen that sky it had been heavy with thunderheads that threatened a heavy dousing of snow. Had the storm passed so quickly?

"Yeah, what happened," Bunny clarified. "You're three days overdue at the Pole. I haven't seen North this stressed since that time the elves almost burned down the workshop."

"Three days?" It wasn't a question, really. He was too busy digesting the fact he had been lying on this hillside for almost a week. The meet at the Pole had still been two days away when he ran into Pitch. "Huh."

"So? What happened?" Bunny persisted, apparently as uncomfortable with the lack of conversation as he was. "Did you take a fall? Your staff certainly looks a little worse for wear."

"Are they all there?" He could barely lift himself off the ground, let alone determine if Pitch had been courteous enough to leave all the pieces behind, but he _needed_ to know.

"Come again?" The confusion on Bunny's face matched that in his voice when Jack finally turned away from the bright, blue sky to look into the other Guardian's face.

"My staff," he clarified tiredly. "Are all the pieces there?"

"Erm." Bunny hesitated, his eyes dropping to scan whatever was visible beyond Jack's line of sight. "That's a little hard to say."

"It's important," he insisted, trying to garner a little more concern for the item from Bunny.

"Yeah, well, considering you were half buried in a drift when I found you, finding all these bits of kindling is about as likely as Sandy striking up a verbal conversation."

And Pitch had probably known that when he threw them down. Or he hadn't left them all. No matter how many pieces he had shattered the staff into, Jack highly doubted the Nightmare King would have risked leaving them _all_ behind a second time.

"Oh."

It was all he could manage to say, despair washing over him in familiar waves. He had felt the desolating feeling more than a few times in his lonely three centuries, normally followed by rage and an all-out tantrum at the unfairness of his life in general, but there was no anger this time. Just a sinking feeling in his stomach as he realized his staff could very well be irreparable. And if it _was_, if he _couldn't_ fix it, then his powers….

"Look," Bunny began, shifting uncomfortably. "We'll, uh, we'll see if we can find the pieces later, but right now I have to make sure you're okay or Tooth and North are going to be on my case. Can you sit up?"

"Yeah. Sure." It was an outright lie, considering that breathing was a painful enough exercise for the time being, but the Easter Guardian didn't call him on it. Unfortunately, that meant the overgrown rabbit took him at his word and levered him without warning into an upright position.

He would deny forever after that he screamed, mostly due to the fact his voice wasn't working properly again and so the sound that escaped him sounded more like a mewling cat than the shriek it otherwise would have been. At the time he wasn't really in a position to care how he sounded, wrapping both arms around his torso as he took quick, sharp breaths, riding out each wave of pain as it came. When the throb had dulled back to a bearable ache he lifted his head just enough to pin Bunny with a dark glare.

"_Don't_ do that again."

"Then next time tell the truth!" Bunny snapped back irritably, though again there was that foreign note of concern in his voice. "What's wrong with you?"

He almost laughed, because _that_ question, coming from _that_ Guardian, could be taken in so _many_ ways. He wasn't really feeling up to pointing that out, however, or finding amusement in anything, really, so he gave a serious answer.

"My staff…" He was having trouble breathing again, a ridiculous predicament really when one considered the fact he was immortal. But apparently air, and the ability to utilize it, was still a necessary substance no matter how little aging one's body did.

"Yeah. I really don't think flying anywhere right now is a good idea," Bunny attempted to nip what he clearly thought was a ludicrous idea in the bud.

"M'not _stupid_." Jack shot him another scowl, before lowering his head again so that he couldn't see the sky warping into strange colours. "It's not just…not just…"

His voice trailed away as his thoughts did the same, vertigo and pain combining in a killer combination that would have seen him face-down in the snow had Bunny's reflexes not been faster than Jack's sudden pitch to the side. No longer caring for whatever appearance of composure he had left Jack seized a hold of the arm holding him upright, his other hand twisting into the fur of the Pooka's chest as he gritted his teeth and tried not to scream or mewl or whimper.

He didn't remember the pain of the last time being this agonizing. It had been present, certainly, and lingering right up until the moment he had reforged his weapon, but it hadn't been anything like _this_. He could feel tears leaking from behind his closed eyelids, and his entire body was shaking despite his efforts to still all movement. He sat there for what seemed like hours enduring the torment Pitch's actions had left in their wake, before his mind finally took pity on him and dropped him gently into unconsciousness.

**A/N 2: Please take the time to leave a few words of feedback. It makes all the difference, and I do love chatting with my readers. :-D**


	3. Chapter 2: Aftermath

**A/N: You know those chapters you revise over and over and over and still aren't happy with? Well, this is one of those. I musty have rewritten the ending for the first sector at least ten times, and it still doesn't feel _right_. I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm playing around with the other characters points of view. I've pretty much fiddled with it as much as I can, though, and it's not getting any better, so I'm afraid you'll have to take it as is.  
**

**On another note, I've read the first three Guardian books now, and couldn't help but notice some timeline issues between the written stories and the movie. For anyone whose interested (and not afraid of spoilers) I've written an overly long essay-type thing on the subject on my Tumblr, link can be found under my profile.  
**

**Also, I absolutely _hate_ it when I have this brilliant image in mind for a book cover and then the reality that I couldn't draw it if my life depended on it sinks in. Oh, to be able to mentally project images of the mind...:-D  
**

**Finally, a huge, _huge_ thank you to the incredibly large number of people who have faved, followed, and reviewed this piece. It's been great to see such a positive response, and I really do appreciate it.  
**

**Well, that (more than) enough from me for now. Enjoy the story. The next chapter should be up on Wednesday (Tuesday for most of you).  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 2**

**-Aftermath-**

E. Aster Bunnymund was not easily frightened.

Yes, he had a healthy respect for greyhounds. And maybe he had panicked a bit when young Sophie Bennett found her way into his warren. And he certainly hadn't been at his best and bravest during that largely mortifying period of time when his believers had stopped believing. But the point still stood that, as a rule, he _did_ have nerves of steel, and there was very little that could honestly and truly faze him.

Unluckily for him, cradling the decidedly limp form of one Jack Frost, who had been outright _trembling_ in agony a few moments before, just happened to be one of those things.

It did not help that three days earlier he had been the one to brush off the fact Jack had missed the gathering, the Easter Guardian certain in his belief that their newest addition had finally diverged from the straight path. Jack had seemingly been on his best behaviour since the defeat of Pitch, staying out of trouble for the most part and releasing his gifts only in the parts of the world where the seasons suited his talents. Even though Easter was already over and done with, Bunny had still noticed the alteration in Jack's behaviour. He hadn't been certain what might have caused the change, but he had been absolutely sure that it _would not last_, and he had felt that Jack's failure to turn up at their scheduled meet was the perfect validation for what the others had told him was an unfair belief.

Whilst Tooth had been worried and North ever so slightly disquieted by the unusual absence of their youngest, Bunny had been able to smugly speak his 'I-told-you-sos', remaining happily convinced that the Guardian of Fun was merely giving them the run around right up until Sandy showed up. The silent Guardian had been two days overdue himself, having taken a detour to clean up a small band of stray Nightmares and then finding himself delayed by an unexpected storm, and the first thing he had done upon arrival was to ask after the whereabouts of Jack.

Bunny _still_ hadn't been overly concerned at that point. Not until Sandy had explained that he kept constant tabs on their young friend through the dream sand the teenage immortal never failed to touch at night. Not until the small of stature Guardian had told them, eyes wide with worry and sand images flashing at bewildering speeds, that Jack had not made contact for the past four nights.

It had been around about then that full-blown panic set in.

In Bunny's experience there was no good reason for a spirit to simply disappear. It had happened in the past, and the outcome had never been pretty. North and the others were just as familiar with the likelihoods involved as he was, and Bunny hadn't been entirely surprised when Tooth had turned on him in fury for ever having suggested that something wasn't wrong in the first place. He hadn't really been able to get a word in edgewise to defend himself, or protest at the portion of the search grid the Guardian of Memories had assigned him. Everything had been arranged so quickly that before he knew it he had been the only one left at the Pole, staring at the map the others had been pouring over a few moments before, and wondering how Tooth had come to the conclusion that sending him to search the South Pole was a good idea.

He had gone as directed, despite suspecting it was some form of punishment. Despite _knowing_ this sort of terrain would mess with his acute senses. He had gone, and spent all bloody day trolling through snow up and down mountains trying to catch a scent in raging winds and uncooperative snowfalls. It hadn't been until the storms cleared away that he could follow his nose with any sort of confidence, and even then he had almost stepped on Jack when he found him, all but buried beneath the snow.

For one horrible moment, he had been almost certain the little brat was dead.

Then logic had kicked in, reminding him that spirits _couldn't_ die in the literal sense, and that he wouldn't have found anything at all if Jack's tenure as an immortal had ended. But, still, seeing the Guardian of Fun so absolutely still was unnerving, and when Bunny had first tried to wake to him, the damned idiot had stopped _breathing_.

He had shed all pretences of composure at that point, all but yelling at the insensible form of his fellow Guardian, and not relaxing until another breath was drawn too many minutes for comfort later. It had taken a lot more coaxing and prodding to actually _wake_ the winter spirit, however, and even then Bunny hadn't been sure if Jack even really knew he was there. The youngest Guardian had been responsive, but there had been something entirely too vacant about his expression, and he was fairly certain only half of the teenage immortal's attention had been on what he was saying. That, in and of itself, was neither unusual nor unexpected, Jack _never_ seemed like he was paying attention to Bunny even when he was, but circumstances this time had been different. _Worrying_.

Then Jack had made the obviously foolish decision to attempt movement, and Bunny had spent the minutes it took him to recover explaining that if he really wanted to permanently incapacitate himself the Easter Guardian would happily oblige, but if that was not his intention, learn to stay _put_. He wasn't really sure if Jack had heard any of what he said, and he was _almost_ grateful for that, because telling the winter spirit if anyone was going to finish him off it was going to be Bunny hadn't really been as nice as he suspected a friend in this situation was supposed to act.

In truth, he really wasn't the Guardian best suited to this sort of thing, and by the time Jack had passed out for the second time in a very short span of time he was beginning to wish he had never agreed to participate in the search party for the notorious troublemaker. That he hadn't let Tooth bully him into visiting one of the coldest places on Earth. That _he_ hadn't been the one to find their missing comrade. Ally. Friend. _Whatever_.

But, most of all, he was beginning to wish they had started looking sooner.

To say Jack was in a bad way was putting it lightly, and that was a fact. Though Bunny hadn't been able to find any visible signs of damage, _something_ had certainly happened, even if the winter spirit did not appear lucid enough to accurately communicate what. And the staff, _Jack's _staff that he insisted was so important, was scattered in pieces both on and around its owner, some fragments no doubt buried beneath the snow, or missing altogether.

_Why are you even worrying about the staff right now_? he scolded himself mentally, then furthered his own debatable mental stability by answering. _Because _Jack _was worrying about it, and for the troublemaker to even bother being worried, there must be something to be worried _about_._

As if in answer to his thoughts, the still form resting against his chest stirred ever so slightly, a muffled groan signalling a return to the waking world. Recalling with unwelcome clarity Jack's reaction to being shifted, it occurred to Bunny that moving now, before the winter spirit was wholly conscious, was most likely for the best. Shuffling the teenage immortal's weight slightly he slipped his unoccupied arm beneath Jack's legs, realizing when the hand still knotted in his chest fur tightened to a degree that was almost uncomfortable that he had already waited too long.

Glancing down he met the foggy gaze of his fellow Guardian, acutely aware of how piercing those ice-blue eyes were, even when glazed.

"Welcome back, Frosty," he said gently, adopting a tone similar to that he had used with young Sophie Bennett. Jack would no doubt have taken great offense had he been aware enough to notice, but as it was he simply continued to watch Bunny warily, no doubt waiting for the catch. "I'm gonna have to move you, alright, mate?"

The winter spirit gave a slight nod, but Bunny's sensitive hearing caught the slight catch in his breath, and he scowled, wishing Tooth had had the decency to at least send one of her minifairies with him. He wasn't a bloody nursemaid, after all.

"It'll be okay," he said aloud. "We're just gonna go see North. He'll know what to do." At least, Bunny hoped so. He wasn't entirely inexperienced with dealing with injuries himself, their battles with Pitch in the past had ensured that much at least, but when there wasn't anything visibly wrong and he had no way of telling what was amiss any experience in combat injuries was rendered useless. "But," he added. "I'd kinda like you to leave my chest fur intact."

Jack's gaze finally travelled away from Bunny's own down to the Pooka's chest, and Bunny let out a silent sigh of relief when the winter spirit silently and slowly untangled his hand, simultaneously loosening the painfully tight grip he had on the Easter Guardian's arm.

"Thanks," he said shortly, moving as gently and smoothly as possible as he carefully manoeuvred one of Jack's arms beneath his own and around his back and the other across his shoulder beside his neck. "Now hold on to me."

He didn't give Jack any more warning than that, rising fluidly in a single, swift movement. The arms wound about Bunny's chest tightened abruptly with the sudden movement, before Jack's whole body went limp, the winter spirit dead to the world once more. Carefully juggling the fairly insubstantial weight of his fellow Guardian-it was really no surprise the wind could carry the teenage immortal without issue, the Easter Guardian mused. Not when the kid wasn't much heavier than a feather-Bunny tapped one foot to open a tunnel to the North Pole. He certainly wasn't going to be bounding anywhere, but it was still the quickest method of travel when he had no way of calling any of the other three. Stepping towards the newly opened hole, he paused as his hind paw tapped against one of the staff fragments, frowning down pensively at the remains of Jack's talisman, and then shifting his gaze to the youngest Guardian's pale face.

"We'll come back for it, Frost, all right?" he promised, turning his attention to more immediate matters. Tooth could send some of her mini-fairies to ferret out the many pieces later. For now, Jack Frost himself was the priority. His welfare, and finding out exactly what had happened here.

Bunny had a horrible feeling that he didn't really want to know.

* * *

Pitch watched the rabbit's ears vanish beneath the white line of the snow, unable to hide the small smile tipping his lips upwards, and free of any desire to dampen the sense of victory that had birthed it.

It had taken the Guardians even longer than he had expected to come looking for their errant member, and it would have been the perfect opportunity to gloat over the wounded winter spirit as to the unreliability of his newfound 'friends' had the frost child not been insensible for the duration of that time. But gloating was not what Pitch had lingered for. No, he had waited to see if all he had learned was true. If the 'weakness' he had exploited was what he believed it to be. He still did not know for certain, but the evidence would present itself soon enough.

Smirking to himself, he glanced down at the innocuous shard of wood resting in his palm, dull and lifeless against the darkened hue of his skin. He had seen it brimming with power, crackling with energy in the hands of its wielder, but removed from Frost's grasp it was just an ordinary lump of wood. He should have realized earlier what that meant. That it was not the staff that gave Jack Frost his power, but rather the boy himself who was the source of that energy. If he had known that the first time around, perhaps he would not have failed so dismally.

But Pitch had learned his lesson well, and he did not repeat his mistakes.

It amused him greatly how little Jack's fellow Guardians knew about their youngest member. How little they understood his particular talents. Pitch had spent his time in the shadows learning all there was to know about seasonal spirits, and exactly the best way to destroy them. The Guardians had not bothered to do the same, content in their ignorance, and now he would make them pay for that folly.

Oh, yes, they would pay, and pay _dearly_.

* * *

"We've looked _everywhere_!"

Tooth was, without a doubt, on the verge of complete and utter hysteria, a state of being that was effortlessly transmitted to the dozen or so fairies flitting in all directions about North's workshop. Fortunately, the natural state of pandemonium all this movement caused was not so very different from the general chaos having elves in his factory guaranteed, and thus the large Russian was not at all put off by the disaster scene his private quarters were swiftly becoming.

There were larger concerns at hand here.

He would have the Yetis clean up the mess later.

"How could we _lose_ him like this?" the fairy continued, entirely oblivious to the other two Guardians in the room, one of whom was frantically trying to signal her. Lost in his own thoughts, North only vaguely registered the puff of sand one of Sandy's creations turned into when two of the fairies crashed right through it, earning a huff of frustration from the Guardian of Dreams. "We're terrible friends!"

"Now, Tooth," stirred to life by that last statement, North felt obliged to interject. "We _looked_. Is all we can do."

"We should have looked _sooner_!" Moving too fast for the eye to follow, the fairy was suddenly in front of him, one finger raised to emphasize her point. "Jack is _never_ late for our gatherings. We should have known something was wrong as soon as he didn't arrive! We should never have _waited_."

North sighed slightly, unable to argue with that verdict, waving away the sand miniature of Bunny dancing about his head. "Jack has been alone for long time," he reminded the Guardian of Memories, who was once more darting fretfully around the room, her feathers in disarray and her face twisted with worry. "He can look after hisself."

"That's not good enough!" Tooth snapped, though the anger in her voice was not directed at North alone, but at herself and everyone else who had elected to wait. Sandy alone was blameless in this, though North imagined that was small comfort with Jack still unaccounted for. "He shouldn't _have_ to look after himself anymore. If it were one of us…"

North merely sighed again, knowing Tooth did not need to finish her sentence for the rest of them to understand. Jack's loyalty, once won, was absolute, and whilst there had been some doubt as to whether he would be there for them when they needed him after the misstep that was Easter, Jack had proven himself beyond all doubt in the end.

"Where can he _be_…?" Tooth lamented, almost to herself, though North was somewhat distracted from her words by the sand figurine that exploded right in his face.

Startled, he stumbled backwards slightly, before turning accusing eyes onto the Sandman, only to find the Guardian of Dreams already pinning him with a fierce scowl. Taken aback he watched the flurry of images that appeared and vanished above the silent Guardian's head, eyes widening in realization when it dawned what Sandy had been trying to tell both he and Tooth for the last half hour.

"Bunny is not back?" he said aloud, garnering Tooth's attention and an emphatic nod from Sandy. "He found something, maybe?"

He could not offer any certainty in those words, despite the fact the Easter Guardian was late, because Bunny's punishment for being the one to suggest Jack was merely late and they should wait before sending out a search party, as administered by Tooth, had been to travel to one of the coldest places on Earth. North had no doubt that the environment would have delayed Bunny's efforts, and the fact the Pooka had not yet returned could be as easily attested to poor weather conditions as it could be to a discovery of any merit.

"I do hope he's not missing now, too," Tooth said suddenly, looking twice as concerned as she had been a few seconds ago. "Maybe we should go look…"

"Noo_orth_!"

All three Guardians spun at the sudden shout, the door flying back with a familiar amount of force to thud against the wall, though this time a Yeti was not to blame. Bunny stormed in without waiting for a welcome, snow shaking its way free from matted fur as he did so, and marched straight up to North, extending his arms along with the burden weighing them down and making a single demand.

"_Do_ something."

North, wholly taken aback and completely flustered, stared at the ragged, limp bundle of winter spirit resting in the Easter Guardian's arms, no more confident than Bunny himself appeared to be in what was to be done. Tooth, who up until now had remained frozen in place, darted across to join them, her hands fluttering across Jack's pale cheeks before one came to rest on his forehead.

"He's _warm_," she declared apprehensively, her eyes drifting across the winter spirit searchingly. "Where is he injured?"

"He's _not_," Bunny answered tautly. "That's the bloody point. There's nothing wrong with him."

"What?" Tooth's eyes widened, as did North's, but his reaction was superseded by the female Guardian's. "There must be something wrong! There _has_ to be something we can _fix_!"

The three shared a look that was equal parts distressed and lost, none of them certain of what needed to be done to help their friend. They might have stayed like that, frozen indefinitely, had Sandy not staged an intervention. None of them had noticed the small Guardian float from the room shortly after Bunny entered it, and it was not until North found himself hastily elbowed aside by the familiar, hairy form of one Yeti humorously dubbed 'Phil' that he realized Sandy had returned. The Yeti all but ignored the Guardians themselves, paying Bunny only as much attention as it took to acquire a hold on Jack, then, without waiting for a word of command from North, bustling out of the room with the winter spirit firmly enclosed in his arms and Sandy close on his heels.

Wide eyed, the Guardians stood in place for several moments, before Bunny quite literally exploded.

"What the bloody hell just happened?" the Pooka demanded, straightening to his full intimidating height, an ingrained reaction to confusion North had observed on multiple occasions.

"Was good idea of Sandy's." He ignored Bunny's initial question for the moment, taking the time to recognize the only one among them to have kept his head. "Yetis are better at fixing things than any of us."

"Yeah, well, I hate to break it to you, mate, but Jack is hardly a _thing_," Bunny retorted, folding his arms in a huff. The Pooka's shortening temper was a clear sign that he was worried, and North observed it with a distant sort of thankfulness, glad that whatever enmity still existed between the pair had been largely set aside. "How do you know Phil won't just toss him out? It's not like he's exactly fond of the little rabble-rouser."

"Ech, Phil only pretends he not fond of Jack." North waved away Bunny's concerns, resigning himself to using a name that seemed to have stuck as well as the moniker 'Baby Tooth' had attached itself to Jack's favorite mini-fairy. What was it with the frost child and naming things, anyway? "Reminds me of someone else, hm?"

The look Bunny shot him was far from charitable, but any verbal response was cut off by Tooth's quietly concerned question.

"He'll be okay, right?" she asked tremulously, her fairies echoing her concerns in their own chittering language as they flanked their mistress.

"He'll be _fine_, Toothy," North assured her boldly. "Jack is in good hands."

Tooth nodded, but despite North's words none of them moved from their chosen spots, or made any effort to break the heavy silence that had fallen. North doubted any of them _would_ until they heard that Jack's recovery was certain, and woe betide whoever was responsible for the damage caused if that awaited good news never came.

Or, he reflected pensively, even if it _did_.


	4. Chapter 3: Awakening at the North Pole

**A/N: So I would just like to say that my reviewers (two in particular-you know who you are) are incredibly generous, lovely people and I appreciate every last one of you. Only three chapters into this story and I have already passed my review record by 11 counts. You guys are _awesome_, enough said.  
**

**On another note, this is the second to last 'interim' chapter before the actions picks up again. Hopefully all the talking isn't boring you guys, 'cos it is kind of necessary to move the story along.  
**

**Read, enjoy, and review.  
**

**Cheerio  
**

**Cheekyrox. :-D  
**

**CHAPTER 3**

**-Awakening at the North Pole-**

To say it had been a long time since Jack Frost had slept in a bed would have been the understatement to outdo all other understatements. He had only vague recollections of what it felt like to rest upon a mattress rather than some random, snow-ridden tree branch, and even foggier memories of the feel of blankets covering him. Despite this lack of familiarity, he still recognized almost instantly the sensation of waking in a proper bed, and he certainly knew he was no longer lying on that snowy hillside.

Whether or not that was a comfort or not was yet to be decided.

Opening his eyes slowly he was relieved to find that the light around him was only a soft, muted glow. It was just enough to illuminate the colorful, fancifully decorated ceiling above him and the beige walls on either side. There was something distinctly familiar about his surroundings, and even more so about the soft hum of wings and chirping that now reached his ears. Turning his head slowly and cautiously, letting out a slow breath of relief when he was met with only a muted, stiff ache rather than the agony of the last time he remembered attempting to move, he quirked a slight smile when his eyes fell upon the busy little 'nursemaid' fluttering around the bedside table.

"Hey, Baby Tooth," he croaked weakly.

The response he received was instantaneous as the tiny fairy spun in the air before racing over to hover above him, chirping excitedly as she flew in dizzying circles. He laughed slightly despite the dry protests of his throat, understanding little to none of what the little creature was trying to convey.

"Whoa, slow down," he coaxed, biting back a cough. "I'm okay, really."

Baby Tooth ceased her to and fro motion to hover instead, staring at him disbelievingly, and, in attempt to prove his point, he slowly and cautiously levered himself into a sitting position. He almost collapsed back against the headboard once he was upright, his arms trembling like jelly and the rest of him not much better off, but it was progress.

"See?" he told her, ignoring the tremble in his voice. "As good as new."

The miniature fairy made a short, sharp noise that could either have been disapproval or an expression of disbelief, but, whatever the case, she had no time to expand upon her earlier rant.

"Jack! You're awake!" Joy and relief sounded in Toothiana's voice as she darted into the room, letting the door swing closed behind her with a dulled 'thump' as she hastened to his bedside, wings buzzing to a rhythm too quick to follow. "How do you feel?"

"I'm alright," he insisted, gaze darting between the fairy and her miniature, suddenly uncomfortable with the large amount of attention being focused on his person. Three hundred years of solitude could make one _long_ for attention, and simultaneously dread it once you had it. "Really."

"Are you sure?" She lingered uncertainly, hands reaching as if to touch his forehead, but then withdrawing of their own accord. "I mean, I'm glad you're feeling better, but you were so _sick_ when Bunny brought you here…"

"Well, I'm not now." He forced a bright smile in an effort alleviate her fears, but failed dismally when his throat finally decided it had had enough abuse _thank you very much _and he ended up choking on the words. When the resulting coughing fit had finally passed, and with it the uncomfortable blurriness of his vision, he found Tooth still hovering at his side, one hand resting on his shoulder whilst the other wordlessly offered him a glass of water.

"Thanks," he rasped hoarsely, gratefully accepting the proffered item and sipping at its cool contents. Its soothing effect was almost instantaneous, and by the time he handed the glass back there was no trace of the thirst that had lingered since he awoke. "How long has it been?" he asked absently, watching out of the corner of his eye as she placed the empty vessel on the bedside table, frowning slightly at the frost he had unwittingly left on the glass. "Since Bunny found me?"

"I'm not sure. You've been in and out for a few days," Tooth smiled weakly, blinking back tears, and it occurred to him that she looked tired, concerned, and perhaps even guilty. "You had us worried."

"I'm sorry," he apologized, dropping his gaze to the covers-specially designed by North to act as a cooling aid rather than the opposite-as he slumped slightly where he sat. He was still feeling tired and achy, but it was eons away from the brutal torment he had been enduring when Bunny found him.

"It wasn't your fault," she assured him, shaking her head briefly. "I'm just glad you're okay."

_Okay_? He wouldn't go that far quite yet. He was _better_, but there was still a gnawing chasm inside of him. A space where he had once been able to feel the presence of his staff as surely as he sensed his own limbs that was now hollow and empty and _aching_. His entire body still felt like he had been going one on one with seven of North's yetis for the past twenty-four hours, and his head was fuzzy at best. Tooth looked so relieved he didn't have the heart to tell her all that, however, and he doubted he would have even if his friend hadn't looked so decidedly fragile.

"Hey, Tooth?"

Instantly attentive, she raised her lowered gaze. "Yes?"

"My staff," he began hesitantly, bracing for bad news. "Did Bunny…?"

"Oh!" He didn't need to finish, Tooth's face lighting up in recognition. "Don't worry about it, Jack. My fairies and I found all the pieces for you. They're right here."

She reached out to tap the small, wooden chest resting on the bedside table that he had failed to notice earlier. Reaching for it instinctively, he was pulled back by a sharp pain in his side, hands flying reflexively to cradle his ribcage as he sucked in a sharp gust of air. Tooth observed his movements with a frown, but didn't comment, instead lifting the chest in her own hands and kindly delivering it to his lap. Grimacing at his own weakness, he took the time to cast her a brief smile of thanks, before shifting his weight slightly and opening the sealed casket.

He should have expected what he found within, but seeing his beloved rod lying in so many pieces was still a heart wrenching experience. Swallowing the uncomfortable lump that had formed in his throat, he reached out tentatively to touch one of the surviving shards, garnering the slightest gleam of comfort from the way the wooden handle, even fragmented, frosted at his touch. He believed, _hoped_, that meant the staff was still repairable, but he wasn't sure if he was up to trying to bind the pieces of his weapon, of _himself_, back together again right now.

"Jack?" Tooth's quietly concerned inquiry startled him out of his thoughts, and he lifted his head to glance at the fairy as he blinked back tears he had not even realized were forming. There was a question in her gaze, but he was not at all certain of how to answer it.

"Thank you," he said instead, as he reverently closed the lid on the small chest. "For finding these."

"You're welcome." She flashed him a brief smile, but it fell quickly, her hands fidgeting nervously as her gaze darted around the room. "Jack, is it alright if I…That is to say, do you remember what happened?"

It was only then that he recalled that he hadn't actually _told_ Bunny _why_ he was in the state in which the Easter Guardian had found him, and his hands tightened unconsciously around the wooden box resting in his palms as he realized the full impact of what he had yet to disclose. Tooth must have sensed his unease, because she swiftly retracted the question.

"I'm sorry," she apologized hastily. "I didn't mean to upset you."

"You didn't," he told her without looking up, his eyes focused on the closed container in his hands. "I just…it's not good news, Tooth." Hesitantly, he forced his gaze away from the chest clasped between his fingers, meeting her magenta stare with his own icy blue one. "Pitch is back."

"_Pitch_?" Shock flashed across her face, followed quickly by horror, and then a surprising amount of anger. "_He_ was the one who did this to you?"

"Well, technically, he didn't do anything to _me_," Jack tried to ease the tension now clouding the air, but Tooth was having none of it.

"How can you _say_ that?" she demanded, clearly furious, though not at _him_. "Look at what he _did_ to you! Oh, I shouldn't have stopped myself at one punch! He deserved so much more!"

"Tooth?" Somewhat concerned by the sheer amount of _wrath _rolling off the fairy, Jack tried to stop her ongoing tirade.

"And how did he even survive?" the female guardian continued fretfully, darting back and forth across the foot of the bed. "The fearlings _swallowed_ him whole, and even if they didn't he shouldn't have been strong enough to do…to do _this_."

"Tooth, come on…" Pushing himself further upright on the pillows with an effort, Jack tried again to arrest Tooth's focus.

"We should have finished him off ourselves!" she stated obliviously, the look on her face quite frankly intimidating. "We should have made sure it was done _properly_."

"Tooth. _Tooth_, hey!" Tooth jerked to an abrupt halt, spinning about to face him, and, having gained the other Guardian's attention at long last, Jack relaxed slightly. "It's okay," he reassured her gently. "I'm fine, really."

Shaking her head and folding her arms, the colourful fairy huffed slightly, "You're _not_ 'fine', and Pitch _did_ deserve more."

"Maybe," he allowed, not exactly feeling charitable towards the Nightmare King himself at that very moment. "But you're a Guardian, Tooth, you have to set a good example here."

"Like you do?" she asked, clearly amused, and Jack winced, though he was inwardly relieved the fairy's small explosion was over and done with.

"Give me a break," he responded with a wry grin. "I'm new at this."

"Don't be silly," Tooth scolded smilingly, calm again, as she hovered near the head of the bed. "You're doing a wonderful job."

"Yeah?" He shot her a sidelong glance, shifting slightly as he attempted to get comfortable, though it was almost impossible with every muscle in his body dead set against allowing him that much. "Maybe you should tell Bunny that sometime. We seem to disagree on methodology too often for it to be healthy."

"Well, Spring is his thing and Winter is yours," Tooth reminded him. "You're bound to have differences. That doesn't mean he doesn't think you're doing a good job. _And_," she added, one finger raised. "Don't think that just because you changed the subject I've forgotten what we were talking about before."

"So long as you're not still threatening to rip Pitch limb from limb…" Jack cautioned, not wanting to see a repeat of Tooth's earlier outburst.

"_Something_ is going to have to be done about him," the fairy insisted, clasping her elbows in her hands she pursed her lips thoughtfully. "We can't just let him get away with this."

"I doubt whether he'll try anything like this again any time soon," Jack informed her softly, dropping his gaze to the wooden chest still resting in his lap, his thoughts drifting to its precious contents. "We weakened him a lot by stopping his plans, and he must have used most of his remaining strength to get his revenge on me. Wherever he is now, I'm pretty sure he's probably recovering."

That was his _hope_, at least. He really didn't care for any of the other possibilities that came to mind.

"Then now is the best time to get him alone for a good long talk," Tooth stated determinedly. "As soon as I tell the others he was the one who did this, I'm sure they'll be looking for him. We would have been already, but we didn't know…"

"It's not really his fault, you know," Jack ventured softly, the words tumbling from his lips before he had a chance to stop them, or even to realize he was _saying_ them. But the echo was there in the back of his mind, the words that had been so false and true at the same time. He could hear the whispers of '_to have a family_', '_we don't have to be alone_', and '_they'll believe in both of us_'. Whispers that wouldn't go away, despite every effort on his part to convince himself that Pitch was the _bad_ guy. That, if anything, he should feel _angry _at the Nightmare King, not empathetic. But the thing was that he was _both_, and he had no more control over that than he did over his reaction to finally being visible.

Nevertheless, despite a complete and utter lack of hold on his emotions, he was acutely aware of the moment when the Tooth Fairy's gaze snapped to focus on him, even if he didn't look up to meet it. Tooth and the others couldn't comprehend this, he knew. The empathy between himself and Pitch, a connection and understanding that had been birthed of their shared isolation. The pair of them had enough similarities as to be frightening at times, and Jack couldn't help but wonder if, had things been just a little bit different, he would have said 'yes' when the Nightmare King offered him the world.

Pitch had told him his greatest fear was not being believed in. Not knowing _why_. And maybe that had been true, once. Now, though, his greatest fear was that he would become like Pitch. That the Guardians would realise the mistake the Man in the Moon had made in choosing him, and he would be cast out, isolated, and embittered once more. Remembering what Pitch had done, _why_ he had done it, helped reassure Jack that he would never do the same, but the fear still lingered.

"What do you mean?" Tooth asked, equally subdued, but curious and slightly confused as well.

"He's invisible to the world," Jack reminded her, trying to put his own feelings into words he knew would describe Pitch's. "And when no-one can see you, you'll do almost _anything_ to be seen. To be _believed _in."

He had thought about this often in the wake of the Nightmare King's defeat. Had remembered the absolute _devastation_ that had crossed Pitch's face when he woke after Sandy's attack and realized he was invisible once more. He knew the expression well, even if he had never seen it before, because it had been the same as that he doubtlessly wore on his own face when he first awoke and stumbled into that village only to have his world come crumbling down around him when he discovered he didn't even _exist_. He doubted he could ever fully explain it to the Guardians, however. How was he to stand before the Big Four, who had suffered and even _died_ to _stop _Pitch, and tell them he felt guilty for not being able to _help_ the dark spirit. They wouldn't understand it. They wouldn't understand _him_, and a part of Jack feared that they never would. That he would always be an outsider despite his rank as a Guardian.

He couldn't tell Tooth that, though, so when he continued it was with words that failed to embody a fair portion of the truth. "What he did was wrong, but he was _visible_, even if only for a little while, and we took that away from him," he explained softly. "You can't really blame him for being angry about that."

"Being angry is one thing," Tooth said stiffly, after a long moment of silence. "Doing _this_…There's nothing that can justify it."

"I rejected him." It had seemed so insignificant a moment at the time, wrapped up as he had been in his own mantle of guilt and shame, but he could still remember how euphoric Pitch had been at the idea of having a partner. At working together with someone else in his schemes for world domination. He could also remember that brief flash of hurt his own rebuffing had elicited from the dark spirit, barely there, but enough for him to recognize it when he looked back. "I made it personal."

"That doesn't make it your fault," she insisted stoutly.

"I'm not saying it does," he agreed. Except that maybe, buried deep inside, there was a part of him that believed the exact opposite. "All I'm saying is that I know, perhaps better than anyone, exactly what that feels like."

Tooth's expression fell slightly, and Jack frowned, uncertain as to what he had said to upset her.

"I'm sorry, Jack," she said in hushed tones, her eyes downcast, voice little more than a whisper.

"For what?" Bewildered by the turn in the conversation, he merely stared at the top of her head blankly, convinced he had said something wrong.

"I've never even thought about what it was like for others," Tooth confessed sadly. "I mean, even when the Guardians started out we had few enough believers, but our gifts…what we bring is something that can't be explained away. Easter Eggs. Coins under the pillow. Presents at Christmas. Even special dreams. They need an explanation, and that explanation makes children believe. Others aren't so lucky. What they bring to the world isn't so obvious, and I never thought…"

She hesitated, tentatively lifting her eyes to study his face.

"I'm sorry," she clarified. "That we left you alone for so long."

He really wasn't sure what to say to that. Whilst the apology was heartfelt, and he was certain she had meant it, accepting it at face value was perhaps not as easy as it should have been. He had turned down being a Guardian when it was first offered because he hadn't wanted to lose his independence, not to mention the fact they had been practically forcing the position down his throat and Jack Frost did _not _react well to being forced to do _anything_. It hadn't escaped his notice that it had been the Man in the Moon, _not_ the Guardians themselves, that chose him to stand among their ranks. Nor had he been oblivious to the fact that, had the choice been up to them, they may very well have chosen anyone _but_ him.

He _knew_ the Guardians had only accepted him because they had been _told_ to, but he had pushed that aside, along with every bitter thought and shred of resentment that could have prevented him from helping them no matter what trinket they enticingly dangled before his eyes. He had done so because, despite all of that, going with them to the Tooth Palace, before he had even _known _that his memories would be there, wasn't about being a Guardian so much as it was being _with_ them. With _anyone_.

He had never expected it to last, to be permanent, and he had _known_ that risking even a few hours in their apparently willing company was going to make the inevitable severance all the more agonizing, but he had wanted to belong so _badly_ that he had let himself forget that. It had been a perilous decision, because what he had begun to tentatively hope would never happen _had_. Because, as painful as Pitch destroying his staff had been, Jack didn't think anything could have hurt him as badly as that moment when the Guardians turned away from him. When everything he had dreamed of, everything he had finally been able to actually _experience_, had been stripped away from him layer by layer, starting with Bunny's vehement declaration that he 'had to go' and finished, utterly and completely, by Tooth and North's refusal to even look at him.

Jack wasn't a selfish person by nature, he really wasn't, and he didn't typically hold grudges either. Spending time with the Guardians had been the best thing to happen to him in his three hundred years, and he hadn't been about to let almost as much time spent in solitude because not one of them had time to do more than throw a reprimand-or a boomerang, depending on Bunny's mood-his way stop him from enjoying what he had _now_. That didn't mean he had forgotten the way he had been treated. It didn't make the hurt of those centuries fade away. It didn't smooth over the raw and jaggedly bleeding wounds of their utter rejection, something they seemed to have forgotten as soon as it was over and done with.

He had apologized for not being there to save Easter.

They had never done the same for not being there to save him.

Well, until now.

"It doesn't matter, Tooth," he found himself saying, even though it really did, the words leaving his lips placations he had heard from their own. "You guys are busy all year round, I get that. Besides, we all know I don't really fit the same criteria as you guys."

"That's not an excuse," she answered him, holding his gaze now, looking for something, though he was too tired and feeling too raw to bother trying to guess what. "Sometimes I think we spend too much time locked up in our havens. Locked away from the world. We've forgotten what it's like to be a part of it. Forgotten that there are others like us out there."

"Well, you remember now. That's got to count for something, right?"

Tooth continued to study him thoughtfully for a moment longer, before slowly shaking her head. "You're very forgiving."

"Nah," he waved away her words, because it was far easier to do that, to _ignore _this, then it was to let that dark ball of resentment, anger, and hatred inside of him see the light of day. "I just know better than to pick a fight with someone when I'm down for the count."

"Oh, of course!" Startled, Tooth rose higher into the air again, hovering above the bed. "You must be tired. I should let you get some rest."

Jack opened his mouth to protest that the Guardian of Fun was _never_ tired, before realizing that he was, in fact, fairly close to being utterly exhausted, and closing it without uttering a word.

"I have to get back to my rounds, but Baby Tooth will be here if you need anything, and North is in his workshop," Tooth told him with an understanding smile. "Take care of yourself, Jack. I'll be back to see you again tomorrow."

Jack offered the fairy a tired wave as she departed from the room, rolling cautiously onto his side and cradling the box and its cargo protectively against his chest. He hadn't lied to Tooth when he said he understood why Pitch was doing what he was doing, but understanding didn't automatically denote agreement, and there was a part of him that fully agreed with Tooth's less than charitable intentions towards the Nightmare King. Revenge was going to have to wait for the time being, however, because right now he didn't have strength enough to kick off the blanket, let alone take on the demented spirit.

When he was recovered, though, Tooth wouldn't be the only one Pitch had to watch out for.

* * *

Pitch's lair was a true work of art, created at the pinnacle of its master's power and never touched by the light of the world above. He had flooded its dark depths with every trick he knew, with illusions that came to life in a way no Nightmare ever could. One's worst fears, no matter how buried, how _hidden_, became reality in the shadowy hollow he had made for himself in this deepest and darkest of places, and _oh_ how he had delighted in seeing his fellow spirits unravel when everything they feared came crashing down upon their heads. It was fortunate indeed that the Guardians did not care for or keep tabs on those immortals who were not a part of their little team. Too often there was no one to notice when spirits went missing, and Pitch wouldn't have had it any other way.

It wouldn't have mattered if they _had_ noticed, however.

No one could find this place unless _he_ wanted them to.

It was to these dark depths of his own creation that Pitch had retreated to lick his wounds in the face of his somewhat crushing defeat at the hands of the Big Four and the downright _brat _they had, for some unfathomable reason, decided to make one of their own. But Pitch had never been one to lie idly by in the face of failure, and it had not been long before he began to seek ways of getting his revenge on those who had dared stand in his path. He had walked this road too many times to stray from its continuous cycle now, and he fully intended to find its end, no matter how long a journey that might prove to be.

Jack Frost had been the obvious choice of target from amongst the merry troupe to which he belonged. Not only did the winter spirit travel alone and rarely check in with his fellows, but Jack also possessed a weakness unique to his kind. Something the dark spirit would not have been able to use against any of the others.

To Pitch's mind, it was…_regrettable_ that Jack Frost had made the unadvisable decision to side with the Guardians. He had been overly generous in his offer to the winter spirit, and every shred of logic had dictated that Jack would _accept _the hand of friendship he had boldly extended. The utter rejection he had received instead had come as a surprise, and an unwelcome one at that. Jack and he were kindred spirits in so many ways, they could easily have become something great together, something _unstoppable_, but youthful ignorance and stubbornness had triumphed over common sense, and Jack's foolishly naïve belief in adhering to the _good _side had destroyed whatever chance of an amicable relationship they had.

Pitch did not regret what he had done to the winter spirit out of a need for retribution.

He did, however, regret that it had ever been necessary.

But regret served no purpose in war, and his battles against the Guardians were not yet over. He had used almost every weapon in his arsenal in his attempts to undermine and destroy them, and yet he had failed every time. Now, though, he did not intend to utilize any creation made by his hands. Instead his weapon had been carefully chosen from the Guardian's own ranks, a creation of the Man in the Moon himself. The Guardians believed in working together as a unit, in trusting one another and relying on the separate members of their team. Well, so be it. He would strike them where they were strongest, and make what gave them their power their weakness.

The Guardians would never abandon one of their own, and it was that unmoving loyalty he meant to use to destroy them.

There was work to be done in the meanwhile, however. His haven was ready. The trap laid. All that was necessary now was for the guests of honor to arrive, and Pitch knew _exactly_ how to draw his prey in. He had to be careful, however, extremely careful. One wrong move and his quarry would escape him, or, worse still, not come alone. No, he needed to make sure the Guardians themselves were out of the way before he set about preparing the means of their demise, and with that thought in mind he turned to the small hoard of Nightmares hovering in the shadows.

A surprising number of the Sandman's corrupted creations had survived the war, most likely due to the fact the Guardians had been focused on _him_, not _them_, despite the fact the Nightmares were spread all across the globe. That was their mistake, and yet another thing he could use again them.

"Go," he hissed in command, pointing to a deeper darkness in the shadows, a hole that would lead them right to where they needed to be. "Draw them out." Smiling slowly as they whinnied in response before thundering through the exit, he spoke to the emptiness they left in their wake. "I will see to the rest."

* * *

Toothiana was _not_ neglecting her duties as a Guardian. Not technically, anyway. Because her job was protecting children, and part of protecting children meant making sure the other Guardians were fit to play their own role in the small team they made. That was the justification she had used to give credence to her thrice daily visits to the North Pole ever since Bunny had found Jack and brought him back to the safe haven, and it was that same excuse-_reason_-that delayed her return to the Tooth Palace as she turned instead deeper into the heart of the factory, searching out the familiar entrance to North's workshop.

She didn't bother knocking on the open door, letting the gentle hum of her wings announce her presence, and it was a sign of how on edge they had all been that North did not hesitate to set his current project aside as soon as he realized she was there. Grateful that she finally had some good news to impart, and trying not to think about the more saddening aspects of the conversation she had just shared with their newest member even though she knew they would have to be confronted sooner or later, Tooth forced a smile.

"He's awake."

North breathed out a Russian exclamation too quietly for Tooth to catch, before bounding to his feet with characteristic exuberant energy as he clapped his hands together. "Good, good!" He beamed, then, catching her lack of enthusiasm, frowned. "That is good news, no?"

"Of course it is," she hastened to agree. "Except…Except Jack told me what happened, North, and…and, well, Pitch is back."

"Pitch?" The big man's eyes grew wide. "Impossible!" he refuted. "We sent him running with tail between legs!"

"Jack is certain," Tooth told him reprovingly, demanding that he take this seriously. "And I believe him. Who else would _do_ this to one of us, North? There are quarrels between the others, certainly, but nothing like this! Besides, none of them would dare lay a hand on a Guardian."

"Is true," North conceded, a little of his buoyancy fading with the admittance. "But _Pitch_?"

"I know." Recognizing his disbelief for what her own feelings had been, she answered simply, "We've already beaten him. This should be over." Hesitating, she continued, "We need to find him."

"And do what?" North inquired, raising an eyebrow at her in question. "We already defeated the Boogeyman. Is nothing more we can do to him now. No one believes in him anymore."

"But we can't just let him get away with this!" she protested, fearful that he meant to do nothing. It was not that North was heartless, but now that the threat was over and Easter was past and Christmas slowly growing ever closer the big Guardian had adopted his usual single-minded focus. "Look at what he _did_, North!"

"And you know where to find him, then, hm?" North inquired. "You know where he hides?"

"Well, no," she was forced to admit that much, and North took full advantage of the admission.

"And neither do I," he told her. "So you see, Tooth, is not a matter of _letting_ Pitch get away with what he has done. We do not know where to look."

She deflated slightly at the truth of that statement, lowering her gaze from his and frowning fiercely as she considered how thoroughly Pitch had outmanoeuvred them.

"How did he even come back?" she wondered aloud.

"I do not know," North replied. "But we will make sure he can do no more damage."

"We should tell Bunny and Sandy," Tooth agreed, realizing, a little late, she admitted, that this event affected more than just Jack. "They need to know to be careful."

"And you, too, should watch Tooth Palace closely," the big man reminded her. "Pitch should not be strong enough to be danger, but we cannot be too careful."

"Yes, I should be heading back." Reluctantly moving towards the door she hesitated a moment. "North…"

"I will make sure he is looked after," the Christmas Guardian assured her with a knowing look. "Shoo, Tooth! We both have work that needs doing."

Smiling weakly she nodded before flitting out of the room, forcing herself _not_ to turn back down the hallway she had come from, but rather away, back to duties she had been neglecting.

But with good reason, she told herself firmly.


	5. Chapter 4: Trust and Rabbits

**A/N: So a couple of chapters ago I mentioned in my author's note that I really wished I could draw well enough to put the idea for a book cover I had onto paper. That was me, you know, just generally complaining. :-) However, two of my lovely, lovely reviewers read that little bit of wishful thinking and very generously offered to draw the desired scene for me. Somewhat greedily, I said 'yes' to both of them, and that little image you see up in the corner is the first result. I cannot thank guardian-of-fun enough for drawing that for me. Nobody in my family is an artist, so the generosity of my reviewers is about the only way I can get a personalized cover for my fanfiction.**

**On a more story orientated note, there are a few things I'd like to say in regards to this fic. If you are not a fan of long author's notes, you may feel free to skip this, I just want to address a few issues.**

**First of all I'd just like to point out that this story is already written all the way up to Chapter Twelve. Whilst I may go back over unposted chapters and edit them a little, the plotline is pretty set, and not likely to change.**

**Secondly, I feel like I've neglected North a little bit in these earlier chapters, but that's largely due to the fact I write from whichever point of view is most comfortable for me in any given scene and North's just didn't seem to fit in anywhere. I'm trying to write a few from his point-of-view later on in the story, but it all depends on what works out for me.**

**Thirdly, I received a review on this last chapter with some very pertinent questions, and whilst I replied privately I am also going to post the answer here for everyone else to see.**

**_Review_-"The only things that has caught my attention and comes off a little strange to me is Jack's staff... wouldn't the other guardians notice that it had been snapped by someone? It's not like it flew into something and shattered into at least fifteen pieces - someone clearly broke it and I think that the state of  
his staff would have thrown more warnings to the guardians then it did." **

**_Response_-"It may not have been implied strongly enough, but once they were done worrying the Guardians DID realize the damage couldn't have possibly been caused be accident, hence Tooth's question about what happened, and her caution in asking it. If the Guardians had still believed by this point that Jack had merely taken a tumble Tooth probably wouldn't have been so tentative. Even with whatever suspicions they had, however, the Guardians had no way of knowing WHO was responsible and didn't suspect Pitch seeing as they had witnessed him being dragged away by the Nightmares. It isn't exactly a secret (at least, in this story) that Jack isn't that popular among the other immortals, so even if the Guardians suspected someone had attacked him there was quite a large list of possibilities."**

**I think it's important for me to say that this story has been written in an incredibly short amount of time. When I'm working on my Original Works I spend hours and hours going over backstory, dates, and the plot to make sure there are no holes, but I confess to not taking as much care with fanfiction, particularly not one that practically writes itself like this one does. That said, if you guys DO spot anything you think is a plothole, mistake, etc, don't hesitate to point it out. I'll do my best to either explain or fix the issue.  
**

**Read, review, and enjoy.  
**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 4**

**-Trust and Rabbits-**

Bunny had stayed away from the North Pole for three days.

It was not unusual for him to do so. After all, the Guardians rarely visited one another, and the more frequent get togethers they had been having of late were more due to their new addition than anything else. North had determined that regular gatherings were the best way to keep an eye on their latest member, though Bunny suspected a part of the reasoning behind that decision had been the guilt that they all shared at the realization of just how lonely Jack Frost had been before they approached him at the Man in the Moon's request. Besides, Pitch's bitterness over his own isolated state had been a warning, no matter how obtuse, of how _dangerous_ it was to leave any one of their kind ignored and neglected.

Bunny didn't like to think about it, but the errant thought had drifted through his mind that a few hundred years more of disregarding the winter spirit could have ended in a very bad way. Jack hadn't turned bitter in those three hundred years because he honestly cared for the children around him, even though they couldn't see him, but how much longer would that caring have forestalled the need to be seen? How many more rejections would it have taken for Pitch to have a willing ally? He liked to think it would have never happened. That the little brat was too kindhearted to ever want to harm and terrify others the way Pitch had. But the truth was that the possibility was a reality, even if only infinitesimal, and it had _always_ been a possibility.

He himself knew the pain of rejection far more intimately than he could have ever wished. He had been a mess after just one day of children declaring he did not exist, and Jack had lived with that constant spurning for _three hundred years_. Realizing now the effect such a thing could have on a person, Bunny was forced to admit that it was something of a miracle that Jack had turned out as well as he had. He shuddered to think what might have happened if Pitch had gotten to Jack first, with his persuasive, seductive words of manipulation.

Regardless of the various, sometimes _frightening _could-have-beens that surrounded his newest comrade, however, Bunny had found himself warming up to the immortal teenager despite his best efforts to remain aloof. When Jack wasn't causing trouble, or deliberately ruining egg hunts, there was something endearingly childlike about the youngest Guardian. An aura of innocence and playfulness that forced even he, the most tautly strung of the Big Four, to lighten up. Just a little. And they needed that, Bunny had realized later, after Pitch was gone and the battle won. They needed to remember that what they did wasn't just about work. It wasn't about whose holiday was the most important. It was about the _children_, and somewhere along the way they had forgotten that. Jack's amusement at their sheer inability to cope with a toddling little girl had been a wake up call, really, for all of them, and had led to each of them trying to connect a little more with the kids they were meant to be protecting.

It was, he knew, another part of the reason North regularly arranged for them all to meet at the Pole, because Jack never failed to act as a reminder of those all important children, and what ankle-biters were truly capable of. When they had all been so focussed on protecting Jamie, intent on protecting all the children, really, Jack had been the one to realize that the best way to protect the children was to prove to them that there was nothing to fear. That they themselves possessed the strength needed to overcome the hurdle Pitch had posed, and that there was nothing they couldn't accomplish so long as they believed. Jack could relate to kids more easily than any of them. He understood children, and, by using the winter spirit as a proxy for their charges, the Guardians were starting to understand them better too.

The fact that Jack had been incredibly smug about the fact _he_ could teach _them_ something had not gone unnoticed by any of them, although Sandy had been spared that much, with Jack choosing instead to rope the dream maker into his 'demonstrations' far too often for Bunny to believe the pair of them were _not _in on the joke together. Nevertheless, despite any unnecessary teasing on Jack's part, the Guardians had freely returned the favour by allowing the winter spirit to fully experience having a family and friends, something he had only ever witnessed from the outside. It was a mutually beneficial arrangement, one they had all found astonishingly enjoyable, and, though he would deny it until the end of his days, Bunny _had_ actually been a little _upset_ when Jack hadn't shown for the scheduled meet.

He hadn't been to the North Pole in three days. His absence had nothing to do with the fact visiting North outside of an emergency was not something he usually did, and much more to do with the cheeky, bright young face that normally brightened every room having been clouded over with pain and fear the last time he had seen it. No Guardian wanted to see a child in pain, and it didn't really matter that that child had been one of their own, an immortal who verged on the cusp of adulthood, because Jack _was_ still a child in their eyes, and seeing him like…like _that_ had shaken the Easter Guardian more than he would have thought possible.

Though, perhaps _shaken_ was not the right word. By the time Tooth had had her fairies collect the pieces of Jack's staff and the Guardians had realized with mute horror that there was no way such damage could have been caused by a fall, no matter how hard Jack had crashed into the mountainside, _anger_ had been the predominant feeling among their ranks. Knowing that someone had deliberately taken away their youngest members ability to fly and then done whatever else they had done to leave him in the state in which the Easter Guardian had found him had not sat well with any of them. When Bunny had stormed from the North Pole without so much as a goodbye it had been more due to the need for a preventative measure to stop himself from doing something rash than a result of any uncomfortableness in dealing with an injured comrade.

Or so he had assured himself.

He had not been to the North Pole in three days, and it had taken him all of those three days to calm his temper and muster the courage to head back to the colder climate that was North's domain, chiding himself all the while for being a coward. He didn't bother announcing his presence when he arrived, offering a curt nod to the few Yetis that registered his arrival but making no effort to actually be noticed as he traversed the inner workings of the toy factory, doggedly headed for the guest quarters. He didn't actually remember which room North had gifted to Jack the moment the boy was officially sworn in as one of their own, but the distinctive hum and chirp of one of Tooth's helpers was an easy enough guide to follow.

He stood outside the door for almost ten minutes arguing with himself over whether or not he wanted to step inside, fortunately with no witnesses to the act besides a few harebrained elves, because if one of the Yetis had caught him lingering like this it would have been mortifying. Eventually, and after a great deal of mental browbeating, he finally slid a paw around the knob, tentatively pushing the wooden barrier open as his eyes darted to and fro, searching the room beyond.

The quarters that North had provided for Jack were sparsely decorated, left largely empty to allow for a personal touch the winter spirit did not seem to understand was required. Or perhaps Bunny was wrong, and Jack's tendency to not actually spend time in the room when he was at the Pole was what had caused it to look so barren. Regardless of the cause, the chamber was all but empty save for the bed set in the centre of the opposite wall and the small tables placed on either side of the headboard. Of more interest was the occupant of the bed, currently seated on top of the dark, navy blankets with his legs folded beneath him and his head bowed, Tooth's little minion flittering around above his head in an agitated manner.

Taking a few slow hops into the room, frowning as he waited for Jack to acknowledge his presence, Bunny caught sight of what it was that had arrested the youngest Guardian's attention. Spread out across the coverlet, painstakingly placed in the correct order and neatly fitted together as best as was possible given the circumstances, were the remains of Jack's staff. The Easter Guardian was pleased to see that Tooth's fairies had managed to find so many fragments, though he wasn't quite sure what Jack meant to do with the shards.

At least, not until the whole collection began to _glow_ blue.

His breath catching in his throat, Bunny watched, enthralled, as the separate pieces slowly began to weave themselves together, pulled towards one another and tightly sealed by an intricate, frosted pattern. Shard by shard the staff slowly took shape, but then, with a suddenness that took him wholly by surprise, the glow abruptly vanished, and the pieces fell apart once more. Letting out a small gasp Jack slumped back against the many pillows propped along the headboard, his face the picture of defeat.

He had seen a wide range of emotions on that deceptively young face during the extent of their association with one another, but _defeat_ was certainly not one with which he was familiar. It was disconcerting to see it now, and Bunny suddenly wished he had stayed outside a few moments longer, so he didn't have to witness this. Giving himself a ruthless mental shake, he decided he had gone ignored long enough and hopped forward another two strides, interjecting a flippancy he didn't really feel into his words.

"You do realize you owe me big time for trekking out to that frozen wasteland to rescue you, right?"

"Oh." Finally, the recognition he sought came, though not in the form he might have wished. "Hey, Bunny."

The greeting was listless, and Jack's eyes met his for only a brief second before lowering again. There was no challenge. No teasing greeting meant to spark off one of those arguments that they both secretly enjoyed. Bunny wasn't afraid to admit that that scared him, especially as he did not have to make that admission out aloud.

"Hey, now," he chided, positioning himself alongside the bed and trying not to let his uncomfortableness with this entire situation show through. "Don't tell me I went and rescued the wrong nuisance. What's with the frown, Frost?"

"There's a piece missing," the Guardian of Fun told him hollowly, sounding anything but what his title implied. "There's a…it's not here."

Only then did Bunny see that the top of the shepherd's crook was indeed absent. A large shard, unmissable at close range.

"I warned you, Jack," he reminded the youngest Guardian, trying to be tactful. To be _gentle_. Neither was his strong point, but he kind of felt like they were necessary right now. "It was in a lot of pieces, and even though the fairies looked…"

"No," Jack cut him off. "You don't understand. It's _gone_ and I can't…I can't _fix_ it without all the pieces."

"We can get you another one," Bunny tried to reassure him. He had known the kid was attached to the staff, but right now the winter spirit was trembling at the very idea it was irreparable. "I'm sure North could…."

"You can't just replace it like a broken toy!" Sharp, blue eyes bore into him with anger, the most life he had seen in them since setting foot in the room. The temperature of the room dropped several degrees, and he shifted his weight uneasily from foot to foot, trying not to shiver as the edges of the coverlet frosted over. "I told you, _you don't understand_."

"Okay, okay." Raising both paws in a pacifying gesture, he tried to reason with the now enraged youth. "So, explain it to me."

Jack mumbled something incomprehensible in reply, folding his arms across his chest in a defensive gesture, and, trying to keep his impatience in check, Bunny spoke again.

"Look, mate," he cajoled. "You're upset, I get that, but we're all worried about you and we can't help if we don't know what's wrong. So why don't you either tell me how you ended up like you were when I found you or explain to me what's so important about that stick of yours?"

For a few anxious moments he thought Jack wasn't going to answer him, and that the youngest Guardian was instead going to pull an age appropriate sulking fit. After a brief, tense silence, however, the boy answered him softly, "You know I can't fly without it. You've seen me fall."

"Okay." Whilst not a fan of flying himself, he could understand why that might be upsetting. "So you're grounded for a little while. It's not the end of the world, mate."

"It's not just the flying…" Jack began, then cut himself off, glancing at Bunny with a frown. "What do you mean 'a little while'?"

"Well, obviously Tooth will send an army of fairies out as soon as she finds out there is a piece missing," Bunny reasoned. "She'll have that staff back in one piece in no time, and you can go back to wreaking havoc wherever you go."

It was meant to be a cheering statement, but Jack merely slumped further, his shoulders hunched and his hands tucked beneath his arms. On anyone else, the gesture would have implied that the person in question was cold. On Jack Frost, Bunny wasn't sure _what_ it meant.

"She won't find it," the youngest Guardian confided subduedly. "Pitch took it."

Bunny froze, letting that statement sink in slowly, a boiling, unexpected anger rising as the words pinged in his mind. It wasn't an entirely unfamiliar sensation, because he had, however unexpectedly, experienced the same in Tooth's palace when Pitch had deliberately and cruelly pointed out that being ignored was something Jack was well used to. This time the rage was much sharper, and decidedly more intense. Knowing that it wasn't likely to serve a purpose without having the Nightmare King nearby, he forced himself to curb his own fury, speaking only when he was certain his words would not reflect his own inner turmoil.

"Pitch?" he repeated, seeking clarification he didn't really need. "He did this?"

Jack merely nodded, watching him almost warily, as if expecting some sort of over the top reaction. Bunny considered the younger Guardian's expression for a few moments before realization kicked in. There was, after all, only one Guardian who had been more outraged by the realization that Jack had been attacked than he.

"I take it Toothiana knows?"

"How did you guess?" Jack tossed him a humourless smile, untucking one of his hands to run a finger down the carefully set pieces of his rod. A trail of frost followed his moving appendage, but what would have been a smooth path was fractured by the many visible cracks. "Pitch might want to consider wearing a mouth guard."

Bunny smirked slightly, inwardly relieved at the brief spark of normality that simple statement was. He wasn't used to dealing with a Jack Frost this subdued. It had been North who offered words of counsel after Sandy's apparent demise, and after the Easter debacle, where he had come perilously close to striking the teenage immortal and had stopped only when he saw the shock and fear written in the winter spirit's eyes, Jack had seemed to sort himself out. The Guardians' newest addition was a resilient little bugger, Bunny had to give him that, but whatever had happened out in that snowy wasteland had smacked Frost down so hard he had yet to get back up.

From her position on Jack's shoulder, half hidden in the boy's hoodie, Baby Tooth gave an enquiring chirp that interrupted the silence, and another small smile, this one more genuine, flitted across the winter spirit's face.

"Yeah, Baby Tooth," he assured the tiny sprite with a small grin. "I'm okay."

"Really?" Bunny deadpanned. "You looked in a mirror lately, mate?"

Jack shot him a half-hearted glare, but he refused to rescind the statement. Whilst it was true that Jack was pale at the best of times, right now he simply looked…_fragile_. There was no better word for it. In fact, the winter spirit wasn't in much better shape than his staff…

_His staff. _Bunny blinked sharply, astounded at his own lack of comprehension. Of _course_ there hadn't been any signs of physical damage, because Pitch had clearly known what the Guardians had not; there was an easier way to harm the Guardian of Fun than to actually lay a hand upon the immortal. '_It's not just the flying_…' Jack had said, and Bunny gulped slightly as he stared at the carefully arranged shards resting atop the coverlet, realizing just how much _more_ than an instrument for flight the seemingly innocuous staff was.

He didn't realize Jack was watching him until the other immortal spoke.

"I guess those of us without believers needed a weakness of our own," he said calmly, though his arms, wrapped tightly about his own frame once more, belied that serenity. "Pitch was lucky enough to find mine."

Absorbing that statement, Bunny thought back on his own brief stint of invisibility. It had been mortifying and terrible to go unseen, but whilst he had experienced physical limitations brought on by the setback of being a Guardian, not having any believers hadn't actually _hurt_ him. Jack had been in pain when Bunny found him, and he would lay eggs on the fact the winter spirit was still in pain, or at least wasn't comfortable, if his hunched posture was anything to go by. It didn't make sense, really. Jack _was_ a Guardian now, so technically he should be protected and endangered by the same things they were. Having his staff vanish like Bunny's own weapons had if children stopped believing in him would have been the more obvious thing to expect. But then, maybe Jack didn't have enough believers for that to matter. Or maybe he was just different.

"Can you fix it?" he said aloud, letting the puzzle of Jack's unique weakness slide for the time being. "If you have all the pieces?"

"Yes."

There was too much certainty in that one word, and Bunny caught himself frowning.

"How do you know?" The answer was obvious, of course, and he replied to his own question almost as soon as he had uttered it aloud. "This has happened before, hasn't it?"

"Well, not _this_, exactly," Jack answered evasively, watching him warily again. Bunny wasn't entirely sure why he had elicited such a response, but he ignored it for the time being, focussing on the spoken language rather than that of the body. "It was only two pieces last time. And he was kind enough to leave them both."

"He?" The pieces fell together rapidly. "You mean Pitch? When did that happen?"

"After, uh, after Easter was ruined," the winter spirit answered, avoiding Bunny's piercing gaze. "I went to the South Pole to think things through, and, well, he followed me there."

There was more to this story, Bunny was sure, and the sharp prod Baby Tooth gave Jack, a gesture the young immortal affected not to notice, all but confirmed his suspicions.

"You going to elaborate on that, mate?"

"I wasn't planning to," Jack retorted guardedly. "Nothing important ha…_Ow_, Baby Tooth!"

It had been the tiny fairy's beak, rather than her hand, this time, and Jack glared at the sprite accusingly as she danced further out onto his shoulder to return his scowl with an impressive one of her own.

Bunny smirked again. "You're little shadow appears to disagree."

"It _wasn't_ important," Jack insisted, eyeing Baby Tooth suspiciously even as he hastened to add more. "We just…we talked."

Remembering his earlier thoughts involving Jack being exposed to Pitch's practiced manipulation, Bunny carefully kept the sense of unease out of his voice as he prodded for more information. "What about, exactly?"

Unfortunately, Jack was a great deal more perceptive than Bunny gave him credit for, and responded to that question by moving his arms so that they were folded across his chest, the look on his face one of indignity.

"As if you don't _know_," he snapped resentfully, mood shifting from cautiously defensive to outright offensive in a bare second. "What else does anyone ever want to talk to me for?"

The Easter Guardian would have much preferred to pretend that he didn't understand what Jack was implying with that borderline accusatory statement, but something told him that doing so would only rile the teenage immortal up more. He was both surprised and not by the clear bitterness in the young Guardian's words, because, to be honest, all four of the original Guardians had been waiting for this to come to a head. Jack had never brought their treatment of him up before, but they were all acutely aware of the fact that a confrontation was inevitable, and Bunny wasn't really surprised that _he_ was the Guardian Jack had decided to have this out with. Just because he wasn't surprised didn't mean he was prepared to deal with it, however, and he spent several seconds just deciding how best to respond without risking being turned into an icicle.

"Look, Jack," he said at last. "I'll be the first to admit that the way we went about recruiting you wasn't exactly…well, it wasn't the _best_ approach, but that doesn't mean we just kept you around because you were _useful_."

"Doesn't it?" Jack was far from pacified. "Isn't that the reason you got rid of me as soon as I became a liability?"

_A liability_? Bunny had to rattle his memories around a little to find the origin of that statement. "You mean when Easter was ruined?" he asked, trying to keep his own frustration and disappointment over his lost day within bounds. _There's always next year. _"I was upset, Frost, we all were, and you can't exactly say that wasn't justified."

"Because you all thought that just because I was with Pitch when the Nightmares attacked I'd _betrayed_ you," Jack pointed out sharply. "You didn't even give me a _chance_ to explain. You just _assumed_, because I had my memory box… For all you knew, he could have _attacked_ me!"

It was true, he had to admit, that all three of them had simply assumed the worst. They hadn't asked for an explanation, and had instead made their own. All three of them had been reeling from the disastrous Easter at the time, not to mention Sandy's lingering absence, but was that really an excuse?

"He didn't, did he?" he queried tentatively. "Attack you?"

"No," Jack admitted, shoulders slumping slightly as the anger drained from his taut form. "But I didn't just leave you guys to handle things on your own willingly. And I didn't leave Baby Tooth behind on purpose, either."

"We figured that out for ourselves, mate," Bunny told him, earning himself a slightly surprised glance from the winter spirit. "What? You didn't think it was just coincidence that none of us brought it up in Burgess, did you? Pitch is a sneak and a coward, but he's not short on smarts. He got all of _us_ assembled at the North Pole so he could launch an attack on the Tooth Palace, it really wasn't that great of a leap of logic to figure out that he used a similar trick on you."

It was the truth, even if it _had_ taken a good hour until they all cooled down enough to view both what had happened and Jack's reaction to it rationally, at which point Tooth had quietly started panicking at the fact that Jack had run off and none of them had any idea where he might have gone.

Shaking his head slightly to clear it of his cluttered thoughts, he concluded his summation, "It was the memory box, wasn't it? That was the bait he used."

"And I fell for it," Jack finished, his face twisted into a look of derision at his own naivety.

"Yeah, well." Bunny shrugged. "So far as redeeming returns go, yours was pretty spectacular."

"I don't know," Jack deflected, shooting him a familiar, mischievous smirk. "I think _someone_ managed to outclass me in the cute department."

"You bring that up again, and all bets are off," Bunny warned, trying not to revel in the return of their banter. His words earned him a slight wave of acknowledgement, before Jack sobered again, and with him the mood of the entire room.

_And the temperature_, Bunny thought sourly, stamping down the urge to rub his arms in an effort to warm up. Jack was normally more careful when it came to the comfort of those around him, but right now he seemed oblivious to the obvious affect his ability was having on his surroundings, and Bunny wasn't really uncomfortable enough to bring the subject up. Admitting he was cold wasn't exactly on the top of his 'conversations to have with Frosty' list.

"You want to know what's really funny?" the winter spirit asked abruptly, interrupting the Easter Guardian's thoughts and not waiting for a reply before forging on. "Is that, of the two approaches used to get my attention, Pitch's was actually the more gentle."

"Obviously 'gentle' doesn't work with you, huh?" Bunny remarked, trying to interject some humour into the conversation again.

"It almost did," Jack corrected him ashamedly, refusing to meet Bunny's incredulous stare as he went on. "He knew just what to say…mostly."

"What did he offer you?" Bunny wondered aloud.

"Oh, you know." Jack waved a hand absently, trying to make light of what Bunny knew could have easily been a turning point for the worse in their war against Pitch and his Nightmares. "It was the typical 'everything you've ever wanted' package. The usual villain deal."

"You were tempted." It wasn't a question. He could see the truth in every jesting word. In the way guilt wouldn't let the winter spirit meet his eyes.

"I was," the youngest Guardian admitted without hesitation. "Right up until I realized he fully intended to _terrify_ the world into submission."

And _that_, right there, was the reason the Man in the Moon had chosen Jack Frost to be a Guardian. Because Pitch had dangled everything Jack had ever dreamed of right before his eyes, and Jack had turned _away_. Had let his dearest wish slip through his fingers because he would rather go _unseen_ than be feared. Knowing _exactly _how it felt to be invisible, Bunny felt a sort of reluctant admiration for the young immortal growing in the back of his mind, but chose to ignore it for the time being.

"I'm guessing Pitch didn't appreciate being rejected," he hazarded, and Jack snorted.

"Does anyone?" he asked rhetorically, avoiding continuing with his tale.

Bunny exchanged a brief glance with Baby Tooth, and then prepared to push. Jack wasn't a liar, despite numerous other flaws, and so long as he asked the right questions any answers he received in return would be truth.

"How did he get your staff?" he inquired, having settled upon the most direct question that came to mind, even if the answer he got couldn't have been further from what he expected.

"I…I gave it to him."

Bunny blinked sharply. "What?"

Jack was avoiding eye contact again, but for a completely different reason this time. "He…Well, uh, he had Baby Tooth."

It wasn't much of an explanation, but it was still enough. "You traded your staff for her freedom?"

"I _tried_ to." Jack's face showed discontent. "Pitch backed out on the deal. He only let Baby Tooth go because she stabbed him, so he threw her away, and then he…he…"

"Traitorous piece of slime," Bunny vented, needing no further elucidation, and wishing that the Nightmare King was near enough to be a feasible target for his trusted boomerangs. Pitch had no doubt gone back into hiding after recent events, however, and when Pitch hid you had to rely on little more than dumb luck to uncover him. Even North's snowglobes had a hard time pinpointing the shadowy immortal when he truly wished to pass unnoticed. "But you put it back together?" Shaking himself out his ruminations, he turned back to his conversation partner. "After he was gone?"

"More or less." Jack shrugged, his focus on his decimated weapon again, fingers tracing the missing curve of the crook. Bunny watched him in silence for a moment, before coming to a resolution.

"Alright then, mate," he began firmly. "You've convinced me. We'll find the last piece of that stick of yours for you."

"We?" Jack looked at him, bemused.

"You didn't think I was going to do all the work myself, did you?" Bunny retorted. "I'll need to talk to the others, but we'll get it back, you have my word on that."

"Really?" The obvious surprise on Jack's face led Bunny to believe that maybe they weren't doing as good of a job as he had thought of teaching the winter spirit the meaning of friendship and family. Or maybe it was just that three hundred years of neglect easily outweighed a few months of care. "But, how…?"

"Uh-uh!" Bunny held up a paw, halting the question before it could go any further, because he knew _exactly _where that was going and he didn't like it one bit. "You let _us_ worry about the details, Frost. The way I see it, you aren't in any condition to leave that bed."

"Last time…" Jack, predictably, chose to argue.

"_Last time_," the Easter Guardian emphasized, silencing the younger immortal. "Last time you didn't spend days lying unconscious in a snow drift. We'll handle it, mate, just trust us."

After what he had learned of their misjudgement back on that ill-fated Easter Sunday, Bunny wondered if that was just a little too much to ask. Trust was not, after all, something they themselves had given when they should have. To his relief, however, when Jack finally spoke it was in tones of agreement.

"Okay," he said softly, conceding.

"You rest up, then," Bunny said gruffly, eager to get out of the room now the conversation was over and done with. "We'll have that missing piece back before you can say 'Blizzard of '68'."

Having turned a common sore spot between them into a flippant farewell, Bunny turned and hopped out of the room.

It did not occur to him until much, much later that Jack's acquiescence had come far too easily.

By then, it was too late.


	6. Chapter 5: Bait

**A/N: Sooo, how much do you guys love me right now? :-D  
**

**It is currently an hour short of midday, Christmas Day where I am. Originally, I was going to write a little 5 +1 series of ficlets for Christmas but that...didn't happen, so I figured I'd give you guys another chapter instead. This will be early for most of you, but I'll post the scheduled chapter tomorrow as well.  
**

**Read, review, and enjoy.  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 5**

**-Bait-**

Sandy had not been popping in and out of the North Pole with the same regularity as the Tooth Fairy, but neither had he been exhibiting the same reluctance to visit as his friend the Easter Bunny, and had indeed spent an hour or so each day next to his ailing friend's side. Jack had never been aware of his presence there, still recovering from whatever ordeal had led him to be in such a state, but Sandy had made sure he was present nonetheless, offering silent support where it had been absent for too long.

Unlike North and Bunny-one who had consigned the winter spirit to the Naughty List before he had even exchanged a word with the teenage immortal and the other who hadn't been able to cross paths with the young spirit without disastrous consequences-Sandy had actually taken the time to get to know the entity that was Jack Frost shortly after he was first born, and had, with that simple act, spared himself a great deal of the attitude that had so offended others. After all, it was his duty as the first Guardian to introduce the others to their followers through his dreams. North, Toothiana, and Bunnymund had all received his help in finding their first believers, his nightly efforts the perfect way to showcase their work even when they were not yet visible, and he all too willing to offer them the leg-up he himself had never had.

He had tried to do the same for Jack, though he doubted the winter spirit was aware of as much, but all his efforts had ever left behind was a name that some associated with snow and ice but none believed in enough to _matter_. It had been disheartening to see his own power fail in a task he believed it was partially designed for, but Sandy hadn't given up, and had instead chosen to support Jack in other ways.

Whilst not verbose in the typical sense, Sandy did love to share in a good conversation, and, considering how easily his method of communication could be turned into a game, it had been relatively easy to draw the boy in. Sandy had deliberately made the time, whenever he was able, to 'talk' with Jack Frost, imparting knowledge about the other immortals and how their world worked to one who knew literally nothing. Jack had been a quick and avid student, and, aside from those few times when Sandy's images had gotten too fast for the winter spirit to understand, the two of them had had no trouble working around the issue of communication.

But Sandy was both the oldest and the busiest of the Guardians, superseding Tooth only because his work was his alone, without the helpers she relied on, and he had eventually found himself without any free time left to offer. Years had passed, too many years, but he had never forgotten the bright, child-like immortal, and had always insured his dreamsand hovered low enough that frosted fingers might mingle with the grains. It wasn't much, just a small acknowledgement that someone _knew_, perhaps even _cared_, that Jack Frost did, in fact, exist, but it had clearly meant a great deal to Jack. Enough that Sandy had been met with a shy sort of amiability whenever their paths crossed, whilst the others were greeted with deliberately insulting words and well-designed mischief that never failed to garner results.

It was, Sandy felt, a failure on the Guardians' part that they had not recognized that behaviour for what it was. Any child neglected sought attention, in _any_ way they could, and when good behaviour had not warranted a response from the other immortals Jack had resorted to the opposite. Sandy was still not entirely sure of what had happened on the Easter of '68, having been on the other side of the world at the time, but the event's reputation had preceded it long before he even had a chance to ask Bunny what, exactly, had occurred. Whatever it had been, whether an attempt to gain attention or retribution for Bunny's lack of interest, that blizzard had been Jack's final effort so far as the Guardians were concerned, and he had effectively ignored them as thoroughly as they ignored him from that point on.

Too many years for comfort later, and the teenage immortal was now one of them. An addition that Sandy, at least, believed was to their betterment.

Jack Frost was not without his flaws. In fact it could be argued that he had the roughest edges out of them all, but Sandy was not sure that was something he would ever wish to change. Jack's wildness-that reckless, impulsive streak that could so easily lead to trouble-was easily balanced by the more level-headed members of their tiny group. He brought further diversity to their already motley crew, and with it a certain sense of charm and a lack of responsibility that was bound to rub off to some extent on the more work focussed Guardians.

That was not to say, on the other hand, that Jack didn't understand responsibility. There were certain things the teenage immortal took _very_ seriously, the safety of the children they collectively protected foremost among those, but the Man in the Moon had frozen him at an age where irresponsibility was present in equal measure, and Jack seemed to prefer to show _that_ side of himself more often than the other.

He was, without a doubt, the child among them, and not just in regards to the amount of time he had spent bearing the title of Guardian. They could not help but respond to that. Even Bunnymund, who had for so long borne an almost irrational grudge against the winter spirit, had been drawn in just as surely as the rest of them. The Guardians had never been so cohesive, so in sync with one another as they were now, and yet Jack hadn't done anything to actually prompt as much from them.

It hadn't been Jack's suggestion that the Guardians gather more often, nor had he had any part on the unspoken agreement between the Big Four that their youngest was to be as fully submerged in a sense of friendship and family as was possible. The first had been North's suggestion, and the second, surprisingly enough, had been an offhand prompt made by Bunny, when the Easter Guardian had mumbled somewhat incoherently about the fact that Jack still only had a tiny following in comparison to their own, and must get lonely from time to time. Without even trying, then, Jack had gotten the Guardians more involved with one another, with the children they protected, and with the world in general. Things couldn't have been more perfect, and so Sandy supposed it only stood to reason that something had to go wrong.

Very wrong, apparently.

It wasn't easy to harm a spirit, but Sandy could easily attest to the fact it _was_ possible, even if only a few possessed the knowledge as to how to achieve such a goal. Pitch numbered among those very few, and so North's proclamation as soon as he floated into the big man's workshop that the Nightmare King was responsible for their youngest member's injuries did not come as any great surprise. The announcement that followed, delivered by an agitated Bunnymund, came as much more of a shock.

"I'm telling you, North," Bunny insisted stoutly in the face of the doubt present on the Russian's face. "Frost _needs_ that staff. Think of it like…like…" The Easter Guardian hesitated, and Sandy helpfully created a cloud above his head, nodding when Bunny's eyes lit up with inspiration. "Like Sandy's dreamsand!" he exclaimed. "You wouldn't separate Sandy from his sand, now, would you? Or Tooth from her helpers? Well, it's the same for Jack and his staff."

"But staff is only stick," North pointed out, obviously confused by the suggestion Jack was in any way connected to the object. Considering how rarely the item in question left Jack's hand, Sandy couldn't find it within himself to be surprised at how important it was, and was a little confused by the Christmas Guardian's bewilderment. "Is conduit, no?"

"Nah, mate, it's more than that." Bunny shook his head. "I don't know how and I don't know why, but the fact is that no matter what we believe is possible or not we _need_ to get that missing piece back."

"We have need to find Pitch, you mean?" North clarified, and Sandy watched with interest as Bunny relaxed now that he knew the Christmas Guardian was on board. The Pooka's relationship with their newest member was an interesting tangle indeed, and had been for some time. Sandy could still remember how taken aback he had been at Tooth's Palace, when the Guardian of Hope had attempted to take down Pitch only _after_ the Nightmare King threw words at Jack all too similar to those Bunny himself was wont to toss about. It could easily have been a coincidence, the Guardian of Dreams supposed, but those were one thing he did _not_ believe in.

"Yeah," Bunny replied. "And before you say anything I know that ain't going to be easy. He's in hiding, and when the shadow-slinker hides you need a bloody miracle to find the bugger."

Sandy, with no great hope of being seen, flashed through a few sand images denoting both himself and Tooth's helpers keeping their eyes open as they traversed the world. Bunny, surprisingly enough, caught the gesture.

"That's a good idea, Sandy," he agreed. "But I don't know whether Pitch is generous enough to make his hiding place obvious."

"Pitch is good at hiding," North nodded. "But maybe…"

Before the Christmas Guardian could go any further, however, the door burst open and Phil rushed inside, the Yeti's agitated warbling conveying that something was wrong long before North translated.

"What?" the big man exclaimed in surprise. "Tooth Palace is under attack?"

"You've gotta be kidding me!" Bunny groaned. "What is this? Back up plan déjà vu?"

"No matter what plan is called," North interjected, already reaching for his swords. "Tooth is in trouble. We go."

* * *

Jack considered following Bunny's advice to rest for about all of two seconds. It was probably good advice, and unusually charitable considering who had been giving it, but sitting still had never been Jack's strong point, and he certainly wasn't going to do so now whilst the other Guardians were out looking for Pitch. Besides, he wasn't in a mood for resting. Quite the opposite, in fact. His entire body was all but _buzzing_ with contained energy, and there was a strange tingle in his palms that lingered like an incurable itch beneath his skin. He had ignored it at first, but with no awkward conversations to distract him-and really, why in the name of all that was cold had he told Bunny all of _that_? _Bunny_, of _all_ people-it had swiftly become unbearable, and the idea of following after the Easter Guardian had grown more appealing by the second.

Baby Tooth fluttered fretfully around his head as he carefully placed each of the staff shards back into the chest, closing and locking the lid before setting it to one side and swinging his legs over the edge of the mattress. Gaining his feet was a cautious and slow process that involved leaning heavily on the bedside table until he was absolutely sure his knees weren't going to give way beneath him. Warily removing his hand from that support, he straightened slowly, breathing out a slow sigh of relief when a slight twinge across his stomach was the only protest his body gave.

It may have taken a great deal longer than last time, but he was recovering. As well as someone missing a piece of themselves _could_ recover, that is.

"See?" he told Baby Tooth with a confident grin. "Good as new."

He was fairly certain the chittering response he received in return was akin to a good scolding, but that didn't dampen his mood in the slightest. With his little shadow never straying far from his shoulder he made his way slowly across the room to the door, taking care to make no sudden or jerky movements, not willing to risk the newfound cooperation of his limbs. The hallway outside was empty, and he did not hesitate to slip outside, Baby Tooth circling about his head as he quietly closed the door and began to trudge down the corridor. North, and whomever else he had with him, probably wouldn't be pleased that he was up and about when they all clearly wanted him in bed, but he didn't think they would send him back now that he was up, and he _refused_ to be left out of this mission to retrieve what Pitch had stolen from _him_.

It took him a great deal longer than it rightly should have to reach North's workshop, and when he finally did step inside the decorative room it was to find the place completely deserted. Frowning, he peered around the corners of the large chamber, confused as to where his fellow Guardians could have rushed off to. Surely they hadn't found Pitch already? One of them would have told him if they had, wouldn't they? Chewing his lip indecisively he moved across the room and took a seat on the large armchair positioned alongside the cold hearth, Baby Tooth fluttering down to take a seat in his cupped hands once he was settled.

"Where'd they all go, Baby Tooth?" he wondered aloud, smiling at the chirping shrug of the shoulders he received in return.

Curling his legs beneath him, Jack leaned his head against the side of the chair, wondering whether or not he should bother trying to locate the other Guardians. If they weren't _here_, in North's workshop, chances were they weren't in the factory at all, which left either Tooth's Palace or Bunny's Warren or anywhere else in the world, really. Had his staff not been in over a dozen pieces, he could have easily flown to either of the former, but as it was there was no way to get there save by snowglobe, and he had a feeling none of the Yetis would be willing to lend him one.

So what did that leave him?

Or, more importantly, _where_?

"Stuck here, that's where," he answered his own question aloud, grinning at Baby Tooth when the tiny creature cocked her head to the side in curiosity. "Do you think we should redecorate while North is out?" Baby Tooth shook her head vehemently, and Jack let his head fall back against the chair with a sigh. "Yeah, you're probably right. Best not to upset the landlord, huh?"

Turning his gaze away from the tiny fairy he let it wander across the decorative items scattered throughout the room, taking note of the Christmas tree that he had never seen taken down, and the festive decorations pinned all along the wall. North's study was very nearly a display of all things Christmas, and yet somehow it endeavoured to not be overbearing. It was quiet, it was homey, and Jack could sort of see the appeal in having a space like this all to yourself, even if he had absolutely no desire to be cooped up inside.

He had told North as much the first time the large Russian had offered him a place to stay, firmly declining and considering the matter settled. He had not counted upon North's persistence, however. Every time he was at the Pole the Christmas Guardian would repeat the offer, and whilst Jack continued in his adamant refusal, he had to admit that North was slowly wearing him down. The guest room he had been occupying for the last three days had actually been a late move in their overly complicated game, and Jack suspected North had hoped it would be a deciding one. He _had_ been touched by the efforts gone through to make the room uniquely his, but it hadn't been enough to make him risk staying with North.

Because that was what it was; a risk.

Jack had been trying his hardest since the fight against Pitch to prove himself as a Guardian. To show the others the Man in the Moon _hadn't_ made a mistake when he chose him, chose _Jack_ over all the others who would no doubt have answered the call to arms far more willingly than he had. He still played with children, and generally got into as much mischief as was possible, but he had also made a conscious effort to be far more responsible with his powers. It quite often took a great deal of self-control to stop himself from dousing a spring-time town in a heavy covering of snow when he was upset, but he had managed, because he couldn't afford to fail.

But, even though he felt fairly certain the others had noticed his efforts, he wasn't yet confident enough in his own control to agree to _live_ with one of them. He was almost certain his presence would wear on North, or some mistake he made would ruin Christmas as surely as he had ruined Easter, and he didn't want to lose everything he had just gained simply because he couldn't keep himself in hand 24/7. North would no doubt keep asking, and Jack would keep refusing no matter how much he wanted to say 'yes', because saying 'no' himself was easier than hearing the word from others.

His thoughts, which had been wandering far afield of their own accord, were suddenly brought veering around to more immediate matters when a shadow of _something_ flashed across the window. On his feet in a second, Jack stood, braced and ready, his eyes focussed on the frosted glass. Baby Tooth hovered near his shoulder, letting out soft, uncertain noises of concern.

"Did you see that?" he whispered, uncertain if what he had seen was what he _thought_ he had seen. Baby Tooth merely shot him a confused look, and he sighed, casting a quick glance about North's workshop for some sort of weapon. There were several swords scattered about the walls, but Jack had no idea how to wield any of them, and he didn't want to end up chopping any limbs off out of ignorance. It was with relief, then, that he spied the thick walking stick resting in one corner of the room, adorned with a single, red bow.

Hoping the staff had not been saved for any special purpose he snatched it from its resting spot, feeling infinitely better with the wood in his hands, even if did not resonate within him as his own rod did. Even without that connection, however, a thin layer of frost quickly formed along the woodwork without the need for conscious thought, and he could almost, _almost_ believe that he was whole again. Shaking off the brief pang of loss that sensation had given birth to, he crept across the room to the wide window that took up almost a whole wall all on its own, quietly unlatching the nearest catch and swinging the window open.

The snow-ridden landscape outside was deceptively still, a white wonderland with no perceivable stain. But Jack _knew_ what he had seen. What he had _sensed_. Gazing down on the cliffs below he realized there was no conceivable way he could get down _there_ from up _here_ without being able to fly. Trying not to feel too frustrated at his own limitations, he turned away from the open window, meeting Baby Tooth's inquiring look with a small smile.

"Let's go downstairs and have a look, shall we?" Moving across the room, he thoughtfully added, "And maybe take a dozen or so Yetis with us, just in case."

Approaching the entrance he reached for the handle, only to be bowled right off his feet as the door swung open with a bang. Before he had a chance to realize what had happened he had been lifted into the air and placed squarely back on his feet as a large hand gave him a rough dusting off, the Yeti responsible for his tumble babbling a lot of incoherent gibberish he assumed was some sort of an apology.

"It's fine. It's _fine_!" he insisted as soon as he had his breath back, dancing out of the Yeti's reach. The creatures treated him much better now he actually had _permission_ to enter the workshop, but he was still wary of being within arm's reach of any of them. After all, the last time that had happened, he'd been stuffed in a sack. "What are you doing rushing about anyway? Is the factory on fire?"

The Yeti warbled a response, hands gesturing wildly, and Jack frowned, hoping he had entirely misinterpreted what the hairy creature was trying to convey.

"Something is wrong with the globe?" he ventured, then let out a yelp as the Yeti lunged at him, seizing a hold of his arm at the elbow and all but dragging him from the room. "Hey! I'm coming already, sheesh!"

Despite his protests, the Yeti didn't release its iron grip until they were in the central chamber, leaving Jack to stumble forward slightly, thrown off balance by his sudden freedom, before regaining his footing and turning his eyes to the huge earth-replica that was the cause of all this panic. He did not at first see the cause of the Yeti's concern, and it was Baby Tooth, hovering back and forth above the globe, who let out a startled squeak and pointed him in the right direction. Clambering up on the railing to gain a height equal to that of the fairy, and sincerely wishing flying wasn't one of the abilities tied so firmly to his staff, Jack leaned across to view the dark blot clearly visible on the globe's surface, his eyes widening as he recognized the location.

"But…that's Burgess!" he exclaimed in surprise, eyes narrowing. "What is Pitch doing _there_?"

The answer was obvious, of course. Besides Jack, there was one other person who had done more to contribute to Pitch's defeat than anyone else. One child who had refused to stop believing despite the Boogeyman's best efforts. Leaping down from the railing, Jack turned to the towering, hairy form still lingering fretfully in the room.

"I need a snowglobe!"

The Yeti replied with the same indecipherable tongue Jack could never quite wrap his head around, shaking its head fiercely in denial. Tightening his hold on the staff in his hand, Jack pointed it squarely at the Yeti's chest, his voice low and threatening as he repeated his demand.

"Get me a snowglobe, _now_."

The Yeti again shook its head, waving its hands expressively as it warbled another refusal.

"What is _wrong_ with you, you dumb hairball?" Jack snapped, both worried and annoyed by the delay. "Pitch is in Burgess. There are children in _danger_! We have to do something!"

The gestures this time were even more frantic, and Jack frowned, focussing on where the Yeti was pointing rather than the noises it was making. He had learnt a long time ago how to communicate with the Sandman, so it shouldn't be too much of a stretch to talk with a Yeti.

At least, he hoped not.

"I don't get it," he prompted, hoping a more direct question would garner an understandable answer. "Why can't you give me one?"

Calmer this time, the Yeti gestured at one of the murals on the wall, to Jack, and then the globe, before shaking its head a third time. Jack frowned, putting the three items together in his mind and drawing his own conclusion.

"North told you not to?"

The Yeti nodded emphatically, all but clapping its hands. Jack's scowl merely deepened.

"But I'm a Guardian now," he tried to reason. "Doesn't that mean you have to do what I say?"

The Yeti folded its arms, and he was almost positive it was channelling Bunny with the look it pinned on him. Glaring right back he opened his mouth to continue the ongoing argument, but never uttered a sound as something else drew his attention, a dark cloud flitting every so quickly across the hatch above the globe. Glancing back from the distraction to the Yeti, he gave a curt nod.

"Fine, be that way. I'll find another way." Moving around the obstacle the Yeti formed, he gestured to his tiny companion. "You coming, Baby Tooth?"

Cheeping worriedly, the minifairy darted across the room to settle on his shoulder. Jack shot one last black look the Yeti's way before dashing from the room, easily sidestepping the crowd of elves who had been pressed against the door and fell to the floor as soon as he opened it. Winding his way with practiced ease through the throng of activity in the factory itself, he worked his way down to the lower levels, only to find the backdoor he had spent _years_ trying to get inside now firmly closed, and Phil's hulking frame ensuring it would not open.

Glaring at the Yeti, Jack briefly considered simply freezing the creature, except that wouldn't solve his problem because he wouldn't be able to move Phil's frozen bulk out of the way. He wasn't going to be held prisoner here, though, no matter what North had ordered before vanishing. Pitch was in Burgess, which meant Jamie was in danger, and the Nightmare he was certain was running around outside was his best bet of finding the dark spirit. He was getting out of here regardless of how many Yetis stood in his way, and if Phil thought the backdoor was his only way out than the Yeti had clearly forgotten all his attempts at getting _in_.

Whirling away from Phil Jack bolted back the way he had came, deftly avoiding each pair of hands that tried to seize him, and only half intentionally leaving a path of ice in his wake that insured he would not be followed. He ignored the startled look on the face of the Yeti still standing in the globe room when he burst back in, racing past the dumfounded creature and clambering up the railing. He sensed more than saw the Yeti approach him from behind, and didn't hesitate before making a wild leap _onto_ the globe. He almost slid right back off again, before gaining a hold on the top of the axis and hauling himself atop the great sphere. From there it was another leap of faith to the open hatch, the fingers of his free hand only just grasping the edge so that he dangled loosely above the globe, staring down at the angry Yetis gathering below.

Throwing them a grin just for the hell of it, he tossed the thick staff still in his hands up through the skylight, heaving himself through after his makeshift weapon, and rolling out onto the rooftop above. He took a few moments just to catch his breath, his body reminding him that such exertion right now was not a wise idea, but he pushed those warnings away, snatching the rod up into his hands and rising swiftly to his feet, scanning the sloping ceiling for his goal.

The Nightmare was standing in plain view, its wispy mane and tail streaming off to the side, and its beady amber eyes watching Jack with an intensity that made his skin crawl. Gripping the stave in his hands tightly, Jack straightened warily, waiting for the Nightmare to make the first move. It was obviously not here to attack, or it would have done so already, but Jack was sure this wasn't just a stray. There was too much _intent _in its amber stare. This Nightmare had a mission, and he could not help but dread what it might be.

As if in answer to his reservations, the Nightmare suddenly reared, pounding forward across the ceiling and making a leap in his direction. Spinning the staff in his hands he threw a frost burst in its direction, and _missed_, utterly and completely. Shocked by his own failure to make contact, it was instinct alone that saved him as he ducked and covered his head, the Nightmare sailing over him and pounding onwards across the sloping tiles. Scrambling back to his feet, Jack stared after it in confusion for a moment, before a frightened squeak informed him _exactly_ why he had been passed over.

There had been easier prey.

"Baby Tooth!"

Flying across the rooftop with a speed that paid no heed to the dangers of doing so Jack rounded one of the towers, sliding to a halt as he spotted the Nightmare standing on the very edge of the highest point, facing towards him, Baby Tooth dancing about inside the cage its black ribs formed as she screeched her protests.

_Not again. _

"Let her _go_," he demanded, taking a step forward, the snow beneath his feet hardening to ice as he did so, and the frost coating the rod in his hands crackling in anticipation.

The Nightmare tossed its head, viewing him through beady eyes no less focussed than before, but it did not move. Cautiously, he took another step forward, and still the creature remained stationary, watching him warily, but showing no signs of flight. Baby Tooth made a nervous chittering sound, but Jack ignored her, keeping his eyes on the Nightmare as he took a third step, and then a fourth. He was standing within arm's length of the creature now, and still it had made no effort to escape. Tentatively, every muscle taut and ready for a rapid retreat, he reached out to touch it.

The Nightmare snorted as his hand drew close, its hot breath streaming across his cold fingers, and he paused momentarily, holding its gaze with his own, the both of them at a standstill. Holding his breath, Jack brought his hand to rest on the Nightmare's nose, and then cried out as the world around him dissolved into something entirely different.


	7. Chapter 6: Dream or Nightmare

**A/N: *Looks at review count...dies* XD  
**

**Hello, everbody! Christmas is well and truly over now where I am, but I hope all of you who aren't as far ahead on the timezone race have a great day! Before I introduce you to this new chapter, I wish to make a few notes.  
**

**First of all, in response to Maddie Seth, I expect this fic will end up being between 20-30 chapters long based on the very loose and ever changing outline I have. I highly doubt it will be either longer than 30 or shorter than 20, though.  
**

**Secondly, when I first wrote this story I hadn't read the books, and having read them now I realize a lot of the backstories the characters have in the novels isn't going to fit in with what I have written here. I am going to be drawing on some book canon in the future, but so far as this story and the books are concerned it is most likely going to end up being slightly Alternative Universe. Hopefully this doesn't bother anyone, but I just thought I'd give you guys a heads up that there are some possible book spoilers coming up in the later chapters.  
**

**Read, review, and enjoy, and have a very Merry Christmas. :-D  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 6**

**-Dream or Nightmare-**

_He recognized the tree line before him the moment he saw it. That was no surprise, for he knew every inch of Burgess like the back of his hand. It had been his home for almost three hundred years, even if it had not always gone by the same name. The trees in question weren't all that far from his lake, a smaller part of the larger woods that rested adjacent to one of the hills the children of the small town loved to sled down whenever he brought them the gift of snow. The hill was green now, though, rich with the colors of spring, and dotted with wild flowers that waved their blooming heads amongst the greenery. Moving closer to the edge of the wooded copse, he stared out across the flowing sea of grass, his searching gaze espying two familiar figures at the top of the hill._

_"Snow! Snow! Snow!" Sophie Bennett's clear, young voice carried on the light breeze whistling between the boughs above his head, her excitement conveyed just as easily. Jamie, a few steps ahead of his sister and carrying his sled, turned back to her with a grin._

_"There's no snow, Soph," he told her. "But we can still have some fun."_

_Grinning at the boy's words, Jack moved to join the pair, only to find himself frozen in place, trapped as an observer. A cold sliver of dread formed in the pit of his stomach when that realization sunk in, but he could no more tear his eyes away than he could twitch his fingers, and he was forced to keep watching._

_"Fun!" Sophie echoed excitedly, clapping her hands together in glee. "Fun Jack! Jack, come?"_

_"No, Sophie," Jamie shook his head as he set the sled down at the steepest point of the hill, planting himself on the back and using his feet to keep it in place. "Jack can't come right now, but I'm going to teach you how to sled, so that when he _does _come he can take you tobogganing. You'll like that, right?" _

_"Yeah, yeah, yeah!" Sophie bounced excitedly, watching, and ran forward as soon as he beckoned her, clambering on the front._

_"Hold on here," Jamie directed her, placing her hands on the handlebar. "You ready?"_

_"Go, go!" Sophie giggled, her face split by a wide grin._

_"Alright." Jamie took one foot off the ground, pushing off with the other. "Here we _go_!"_

_With Sophie's shriek of joy echoing in their wake, the pair sailed down the hillside, the sled gliding smoothly across the grass as easily as it had moved atop the ice. They stopped suddenly at the bottom when they hit a rough patch, both tumbling from their ride and out into the soft grass. Laughing joyously, they were soon on their feet again, Sophie seizing a hold of her brother's hand as she tried to drag him back up the hill._

_"Again!" she demanded happily. "Go again!"_

_Obligingly, Jamie hauled the sled back up the hill, finding a slightly different launch point this time, and a few moments later the two were flying down the slope once again. This time Jack followed, his limbs moving of their own accord as he flitted from tree to tree, stopping where the copse ended, and watching the children sail across the flat field at the bottom, the sled gliding to a natural halt just short of the trees on the opposite side of the clearing._

_It was as they both dismounted that it happened, Sophie's attention suddenly distracted from the sled and her brother as she peered into the woods, her eyes bright with curiosity. _

_"Hole," she declared suddenly, seizing Jamie's hand and giving a tug. "Look, hole! Bunny's hole?"_

_"Huh?" Jamie let the sled's string drop as he turned to see what his sister had, his brow furrowing slightly. "That's weird."_

_Jack felt his breath catch in his throat, choking on the warning he longed to shout, but again he was rendered immobile, held in place and unable to do anything but watch as the children left the sled where it lay and entered the woods on the opposite side of the field. As soon as they were out of sight he moved again, gliding across the pasture and slipping into the shadows on the other side, and it was only then that he saw what had caught their attention. _

_The children were crouched beside a small cluster of dead bushes, pushing aside sharp twigs and crusted leaves to study the cave entrance hidden behind it all with curiosity characteristic of their age. Sophie crawled into the yawning mouth of the cavern as soon as the majority of the veiling, dead greenery was pulled away, and might have gone further had Jamie not pulled her back to safety. Jack dared to hope, then, for a single, cherished moment that both kids would just walk away and let the mystery lie. But the curiosity of a child is a powerful force, and Jamie was more inquisitive than most. With his sister set firmly outside the cavern's entrance, Jamie popped his own head inside, his body from the waist up disappearing into the dark hole._

_"There's a staircase here, Soph!" he said excitedly, eyes shining as he stepped back out to grin at his sister. "You wanna go exploring?"_

_"Yeah, go 'sploring," Sophie repeated, just as enthusiastic as her brother._

_"We'll need a flashlight," Jamie told her, holding out a hand and helping her to her feet. "Come on, we can get the one out of the kitchen."_

_The two siblings hastened away through the trees, and Jack was left standing alone beneath the shade their branches cast, awaiting their return. Determined not to sit back and watch this happen, he fought to move, to speak, to do _anything_, all to no avail. He was nothing but a witness to the events unfolding, and he had the most horrible feeling that this had already happened._

_After what seemed an eternity, the two children returned, and Jack's hope that their mother might have put an end to this little adventure failed. Neither seemed aware of the danger they were in, of the fact this was a carefully laid trap, the only emotion visible on their faces the thrill they shared in their new discovery. Jack watched helplessly as the two reached the edge of the cave's entrance, Jamie flicking the flashlight on and shining it through the opening. Gasps of awe escaped both children, then Jamie reached out to take his sister's hands, and the pair slowly stepped inside. They were visible for only a moment more, before the staircase hidden inside drew them down below the line of Jack's eyesight. All was silent and still for several moments, and then the opening slowly began to close, knitting itself together until there was no sign it had ever been there._

_"_Jamie_…" _

_His lips moved, and the sound came out a whisper, but then he was moving again, legs shifting independently of his control, until he was standing at the lakeside and looking down at his reflection. _

_At _Pitch's_ reflection._

_The dark spirit smiled, and then he spoke, "The Nightmare will take you where you need to go, Jack." His smirk widened as he added, "I'm sure I do not need to tell you what will happen if you refuse."_

He staggered backwards as the spell broke, snapping his hand away as though burned by the Nightmare's skin, the stave clattering free of his numbed fingers. His movements were too swift, however, and far from coordinated enough to keep him steady on the icy rooftop, and before he knew it was slipping and sliding over the edge, a cry of alarm tearing its way free of his lips. His fall was unexpectedly arrested when the Nightmare's teeth closed around his sleeve, jerking him to a halt and letting him dangle in the air for a terrifying moment before putting him back on his feet again. He backed away from the creature, more slowly this time, and eyed it warily as he cradled his hand against his chest. Baby Tooth, still entrapped within the beast's ribcage, was eyeing him worriedly, though she had grown silent, clearly understanding her chattering would not free her.

It was a trap. Jack _knew_ it was a trap. Knew that Pitch had chosen Jamie and Sophie to be the bait in whatever elaborate game he was playing. But knowing…it didn't make a difference. Those two were children, the charge of a Guardian to protect, and Jack _knew_ them. He couldn't just leave them with Pitch. It wasn't a _choice_. Pitch had left him none.

He briefly considered trying to leave a message for the Guardians, but the way the Nightmare was watching him told him that any movement but the one Pitch desired would not be received well. Swallowing back the uneasiness crawling in his stomach he stepped slowly towards the still creature, trying to ignore his trepidation about touching the Nightmare as he carefully eased himself onto its hard back.

The Nightmare whinnied, shifting beneath him, and he clutched tightly to its neck on instinct, not at all enjoying the feel of being on its back. The creature ignored his nervousness, spinning about abruptly and leaping off the roof to sail through the air, headed straight for a destination Jack could not name.

Straight to Pitch.

* * *

With a final blast of speed, Tooth ripped her way through the last Nightmare, feeling a deep sense of satisfaction when the black sand creature evaporated into a cloud of dust even as she dived quickly to retrieve the memory box the beast had stolen. Making sure the box's contents were intact, she hovered back up to where Sandy floated on a cloud of dreamsand above the large body of water the chase had led them to, joining the silent Guardian in checking the skies around them for any stragglers.

There had been no open assault this time. The Nightmares had crept in silently, taking advantage of her distracted state, and it hadn't been until they were actually _in_ the vault that she had realized they were there. She had called the Guardians immediately, but the Nightmares had scattered shortly before the other three arrived, so Bunny and North had stayed behind to guard the Palace whilst the two airborne members of their group chased down the fleeing thieves. The Nightmares had put up a good fight, eluding them for far longer than Tooth would have though possible, but the memory box now resting in her hand was the last of them, and not a single one of Pitch's minions had survived the battle.

Sharing a triumphant smile with Sandy, she allowed the Guardian of Dreams to lead the way back home. She caught sight of Bunny and North waiting for them long before she was actually close enough to land, and returned Bunny's wave with one of her own.

"Are you guys okay?" she asked as she joined them, Sandy floating alongside her.

"Piece of carrot-cake," Bunny told her, twirling a boomerang in one hand. "I don't know what Pitch was thinking, but it seems to me like losing for the umpteenth time has sent him off the deep end."

"Is odd for him to attack without plan," North said, his brow crinkled with concern. "Pitch never acts without reason."

"Eh, you worry too much," Bunny waved him off. "We beat Pitch, and this is just his way of showing us how much he hates us for doing it. Right, Sandy?"

Unlike the last time that question had been posed, however, the Guardian of Dreams did not respond, his own expression one of distant worry.

"It doesn't feel right," Tooth said aloud, giving Bunny an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, but I think North is right. Pitch attacked my Palace for a reason, just like he did the last time."

"But he didn't _take_ anything," Bunny pointed out. "Did he?"

"I don't think so." Tooth glanced worriedly about the columns that contained the precious teeth she and her fairies collected. "We got all of the memory boxes back, and the ones he took…They weren't special in any way besides the fact they belonged to a child. I can't see any reason why he would try to take these particular teeth."

"Then there is nothing to worry about, right?" Bunny persisted. "Whatever he wanted, he didn't get."

"Unless what he wanted wasn't here," North spoke up uneasily, his eyes on Sandy as the two shared a telling glance. "North Pole and Warren are both unguarded."

"Heh, speak for yourself," Bunny snorted. "My Warren is _more_ than guarded by my warrior eggs, North, and I would think the Yetis were sufficient protection for the Pole."

Sandy, standing between the pair, carefully formed a sand figure, and Tooth felt her stomach turn as she recognized it, her next words stilling all arguments.

"What about Jack?"

There was a horrendous silence as the three Guardians looked at one another.

"We left him behind at Pole…" North began.

"Alone…" Bunny added, his eyes widening.

"Just like Pitch _wanted_," Tooth whispered, completing the circle. "Oh no…"

"Jack is with Baby Tooth," North reminded her, clearly trying to make the best of what could potentially be a _very_ bad situation. "_Surrounded_ by elves and Yetis. Pitch would not dare."

"Oh, I think you're underestimating what he might dare," Bunny said, in complete opposition to his prior statement. "Besides, we all know Jack isn't the most _cautious_ of individuals."

"I am sure Jack is safe," North blustered. "But we should be hurrying back anyway."

There was a murmur of agreement from the other three, and North wasted no time in drawing forth a snowglobe and dashing it on the ground, bounding through the magical means of conveyance with Bunny close on his heels. Sandy and Tooth followed, and the portal was barely closed behind them before Tooth was darting out of the globe room where it had delivered them, down the hallway, and into the winter spirit's room.

"Jack!" Her eyes darted everywhere around the chamber, looking for either Jack or Baby Tooth, but neither appeared, and only thing in the room to indicate they had even been there was the locked chest set to one side of the bed. Hastening back out of the room Tooth almost crashed into Bunny, shaking her head frantically in response to his questioning look. "He's not here."

"Try workshop," North suggested from behind the Easter Guardian, and all three turned as one to make their way to the Guardian of Wonder's private workspace. Whatever hopes they had had that their missing comrade might be inside were dashed, however, for the workshop was just as devoid of life as Jack's room had been.

"Pitch could not have got in here," North insisted, turning around and around as he searched the room, as if expecting Jack to leap out of hiding at any moment. "Not without being seen."

"But Jack wouldn't just wander off," Tooth protested. "Not without telling someone. Did the Yetis see anything?"

"Sandy is asking them now," North said, frowning at the corner of room. "Stick is missing."

"What?" Bunny, who had been cautiously sniffing the air, turned to the Christmas Guardian.

"New stick," North clarified. "For Jack. Was sitting in corner. Is gone."

"You're saying Jack _took_ it?" Bunny's scowl deepened. "Why the hell would Frosty pinch a stick?"

"Not a stick," Tooth realized. "A staff. He felt he needed a weapon, so he took something that was familiar."

"And if he needed a weapon," Bunny began, catching on.

"He must have felt threatened," North concluded grimly, turning sharply as the door opened. "Phil! Sandy! You have news?"

The other three Guardians hovered anxiously as North listened intently to what the Yeti had to say, the big Russian's face growing darker and darker with each warble. When at last Phil was done North simply nodded, dismissing the Yeti with a wave as he directed his focus back unto his comrades.

"We need to go to Burgess," he informed them flatly. "I explain on way." He met Bunny's stare evenly. "We take sleigh."

The Easter Guardian didn't utter a single word of protest.

Tooth almost wished he had.

* * *

Pitch had once been a general in war, and, whilst that had been a long time ago-_lifetimes_ ago-the strategical mind necessary to hold such a position remained with him as a memento of those days, and a tool to be used in taking down his enemies. Pitch knew his defeat at the hands of the Guardians had left him greatly weakened, and the short months that had followed that humiliating put-down had not been enough for him to regain enough strength to openly challenge them. That did not, on the other hand, mean that they had left him powerless. The Guardians had been careless enough to not bother rounding up the Nightmares in the immediate wake of his defeat, a deadly mistake, and one that had given him the tools necessary to entrap his prey.

Illusions were his forte, and he had been using them to entrap minds and enslave innocence long enough to know that an illusion based upon truth was the strongest there was. Once a reality had been established, touched, and _experienced_ deception was more easily woven, and the mind made more vulnerable to the lightest brush of suggestion. That was why he had needed the children. Why their physical presence had been absolutely vital in setting the stage, and why he had searched for so long to find a way by which to entrap those who could not even see him.

In the end, it was the Nightmares the Guardians had dismissed as being no threat that had provided him with the answer he needed. The dark creatures were not a creation of his own hands, but rather a corruption of the Sandman's work, and, even when his own powers had faltered and became useless, the Nightmares had remained strong. Strong enough to challenge him. Strong enough to try and master him until they realized that something far darker than they already dwelt in his heart. Strong enough to be of _use_. So long as children still believed in Sandy, the Nightmares remained sturdy and, more importantly, _visible_. They were the key unlocking the door that would allow him back into the outside world, and he had not hesitated to use them.

Like the dreamsand they had once been, the Nightmares were malleable, capable of taking on other shapes. It had been easy enough to have them form the cave that led Jamie and Sophie Bennett to the depths of his lair, the nature of what they had once been allowing them to suppress their new, volatile nature long enough to fool their quarry into thinking them not a danger, and once the children were inside his own domain it was all too easy to convince them to believe once more in his existence. The boy, at least, recognized the Nightmares as his work as soon as they reformed into their true selves, and could not help but draw the connection between their presence and his own. The overwhelming amount of _fear _that lingered in the air in his haven had taken care of the rest, and there had been such pleasure in seeing the moment when that determined little believer's eyes widened in outright horror at the predicament in which he now found himself. Dividing him from his sister using only the Nightmares and never showing his own face had only heightened that fear, and the terror now pulsing through both children only fueled his power.

All this sweet alarm, and he had neither touched nor appeared before either of them.

He did not need to, however. Just having them in his possession was surely enough to bring Jack Frost running. It would no doubt have been easier to bring the winter spirit here after their initial confrontation, but Pitch had wanted the Guardians involved, and not just running to the rescue. Let them think they had rescued their precious new addition. Let them think they had him safely in their grasp. Let them bask in their false sense of security right up until the moment it burnt away. That would make the realization that there was nothing they could do all the more painful, and well worth the extra effort required.

As for the additional exertion required on his part to capture the children, well, that had been to serve another purpose, one that revolved around Jack Frost himself. An illusion based upon a reality was far stronger than that which stood without a foundation, and when the time was right, when he had pushed Jack to the edge of the precipice and knew there was no further damage he could cause, he would plunge the winter spirit into the darkest nightmare he could muster, and revel in the chaos that would surely follow.

And when-_if_-Jack emerged from a world birthed of his worst fears, Pitch would stand on the sidelines and watch in triumph as the Guardians' attempts to save their lost comrade ensured the destruction of them all.

He had waited an eternity for this revenge.

He meant to _savor _it.


	8. Chapter 7: Welcome to the Shadows

**A/N: ATTENTION ALL READERS-If you read the last chapter when it was first posted you probably missed the scene I belatedly tacked onto the end. If you don't remember reading a piece from Pitch's point of view, you'll probably want to go back and do so now. It's not a necessity for story continuity, but hey, who doesn't want to hear a villain rambling?  
**

**On another note, this chapter is slightly late, largely due to the fact I was feeling decidedly unwell this morning. That seems to have passed now, but I'm still absolutely knacked, so if there are a truckload of mistakes (grammer, plot, etc) in this chapter it's because I could hardly keep my eyes open reading through it. I'm sure there was something else I was going to put in this author's note too, but it's gone now, so I'm just going to go sleep...  
**

**ZZZZZZ**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 7**

**-Welcome to the Shadows-**

Jack was well and truly lost by the time the Nightmare touched down in an impossibly dead valley where the trees and soil showed no sign of the lush spring growth displayed elsewhere. Dark clouds had accompanied them the whole way, blotting out the sky above, and they continued to do so now, ensuring the moon's glow could not provide even the slimmest comfort. The valley itself was more of a ravine than a vale, with steep sides littered with crumbling stone and twisted, dying vines. It narrowed the further along it went, coming to an end in a yawning chasm set in the rock face that Jack could only guess was the entrance to Pitch's lair.

The cave-mouth itself was huge, more than three times his height and the same and more in width. It was shaped crudely, torn around the edges, and with two hollows in the cliff-face above taking on the rough appearance of eyes the cave itself could easily be likened to a gaping maw, ready to swallow whatever walked between its jaws. Black tendrils of inky, wispy mist floated out of its fathomless depths, tracing winding paths along the ground and reaching ethereal fingers through the air to greet its visitors. It was no doubt meant to be intimidating, and Jack could not deny the ripple of unease that shuddered through his frame as he dismounted from the Nightmare's back, even as he refused to be cowed by any creation of Pitch's.

Fear was the Nightmare King's sustenance, and Jack would not be the one to sate that need.

Stepping away from the Nightmare's side, he viewed the entrance to the lair dubiously, not quite believing that Pitch actually expected him to step inside…inside _that_. Jack might have been reckless, but that didn't make him stupid no matter what Bunny thought, and walking straight in a front door that looked like something fresh out of a Halloween horror film rated fairly high on his 'things-not-to-do' list. He was both simultaneously relieved and chagrined, therefore, when a more solid shape began to emerge from the yawning chasm, and Pitch's silhouette slowly solidified into the Nightmare King himself.

"Oh, how _wonderful_," the dark spirit greeted him with a smile. "You came."

There were a million responses he could have given to that statement, none of them particularly pleasant, but he invoked the self-restraint few believed he had and remained silent, merely watching Pitch warily. He wasn't going to risk anything, _anything _at all, whilst the dark spirit had the children.

"Nothing to say, Frost?" Pitch cocked his head to the side, viewing him pensively, both looking and sounding disappointed. "You're normally far more talkative than this."

"Where are they, Pitch?" he asked softly, but with force threaded through every syllable. That was all he was prepared to say, and all that really mattered. "Where are Jamie and Sophie?"

"Oh, not so fast, Jack." Pitch shook his head, a thin smile lingering on his lips. "This is my game, and, as you know, whomever invents the game also invents the _rules_." Switching his attention from Jack to the Nightmare, he ordered, "Let the fairy go. I have no further use for her."

Not quite trusting that it could be that easy, Jack watched anxiously as the Nightmare did as commanded, releasing the tiny fairy into the air. Baby Tooth immediately shot out of reach, hovering just long enough to meet Jack's eye and to receive the slightest nod of encouragement, before speeding off into the night. Jack sent a silent plea to the Man in the Moon to ensure her safe return, then pushed her from his mind, pinning his full attention on Pitch, who was in the process of waving the Nightmare away. Once the dark creature was gone, vanished into the cave mouth, Pitch met Jack's glare with a steady gaze of his own, lips tilted in a sly smirk.

"How are you feeling, Frost?" he inquired with mock concern, and Jack forced his hand to stay at his side, stomping down the instinctive urge to touch his ribcage. "You certainly took your time recovering, but then, maybe that was your powers trying to protect you. Giving your friends time to collect the pieces before something went horribly wrong. What a pity they _failed_."

Jack kept quiet, though it took an enormous effort on his part. Because the urge was certainly there, instinctive and vehement, to leap to the defence of his friends. To tell Pitch just how far they had gone for him. But trying to prove as much would only play into the Nightmare King's hands. He would see Jack's words for what they were; reassurances that the Guardians did indeed care for the winter spirit's wellbeing, and he would twist them and corrupt them for his own purposes.

_Give him no ammunition, and he will have nothing to fire at you_.

"You cannot give me the silent treatment forever, Jack," Pitch told him patronizingly. "Not if you ever wish to see young Jamie and Sophie again. In fact, if you intend to deliver them safely back to their home, you are going to have to do_ exactly_ what I say."

And that? That _did_ it. Attacking Jack out of a need for vengeance was one thing, but bringing the children into this was entirely unacceptable, and for that act Jack had no forgiveness. He could understand Pitch's desire to be seen, it was as powerful as his own had ever been, if not more so, but the sheer _ruthlessness_ with which he went about trying to achieve his goal was something that went beyond Jack's comprehension. Harming children as a means of being recognised had never even _crossed _his mind, and that Pitch could speak about doing so with such _nonchalance_, so little care for the priceless lives he was playing with, was too much for Jack to swallow in silence.

"What do you want, Pitch?" It took an effort not to spit the words, to not let the fury boiling inside of him loose, but Pitch was still the only one who knew where the kids were, and Jack wasn't going to risk their safety, no matter how much he wanted to _bash_ some sense into the dark spirit right now. "What possible reason could you have for taking kids? I would have come for the shard, you didn't have to take them. They're worth nothing to you. They have _no _part in this."

"As a matter of fact they _do_," Pitch corrected him with sudden and abrupt venom. "_You_ brought them into this, Jack. You _kept _the last light glowing, and had _children_ fight _your_ battle for you. If you didn't want them so deeply involved you shouldn't have brought them into this war in the first place! They're soldiers now, and _you_ made them so. It is true that they're all but worthless to me, but they _are_ valuable, Jack. Valuable to _you_. Priceless, even. I wonder, is there anything you would _not_ do to protect them?"

"If you've hurt them…" Jack began, only to have Pitch wave his words away with disinterest.

"Oh, please," he stated in a bored fashion. "Don't start with the empty threats. You're normally so much more interesting than that, Jack."

"They're not empty," Jack retorted, all thoughts of restraint momentarily vacating the premises. "I _mean_ it. If you've hurt them, if you've so much as _scratched _their knuckles, there won't be a hole on the Earth _dark_ enough for you to hide in."

"Still just as full of hot air as ever, Frost, I see," Pitch intoned with a smirk, wholly unconcerned. Jack fumed silently, hands clenched at his sides, palms aching for the familiar touch of his staff. "That's quite a contradiction, don't you think?"

"So is the fact you actually think you can _win_ this," he answered sharply. "By kidnapping _children_, no less. By the time this little act of yours is over and done with, there won't be enough pieces for your Nightmares to stick back together."

"Indeed," Pitch's response was dry. "You are incredibly confident, considering you are unarmed."

Jack sobered slightly, straightening where he stood to stare his enemy down. "I don't need my staff to thrash you, Pitch."

"I don't doubt it." Pitch did not so much as flinch, his lips tilting upwards slowly in a smile that sent shivers rippling down Jack's backbone. "But that doesn't mean you don't want it back."

The small piece of wood was barely visible in the darkness of the moonless night, dangling enticingly from Pitch's fingers, but Jack didn't need to _see_ it to know it was there. The item called to him with a resonating hum that vibrated within his chest. He caught himself staring longingly at the shard, and hurriedly switched his gaze to Pitch's face, a glare darkening his pale features.

"And what are you going to propose I trade for _that_?" he snapped tautly "I'm not stupid, Pitch. I know you're not going to give it back willingly."

"So you _do_ learn," Pitch laughed. "I was beginning to wonder. After all, this is the fourth time you and I have been alone together, and so far none has ended well."

"Just tell me where the kids are," Jack demanded, ignoring that statement and the warning it was clearly meant to be. "Just let me take them home and you can keep the stupid shard."

He wanted to take the words back almost as soon as he had said them, because he _needed_ that fragment if he was to ever feel whole again, but the kids…Jamie and Sophie…they were _more_ important, and he would have given Pitch his whole staff if that would have guaranteed their safety. It hadn't worked last time, however, and he wasn't really expecting _this_ time to be any different.

"A tempting offer." Flipping the shard back and forth between his fingers, Pitch stilled the movement suddenly, closing his fingers about the fragment. "But are you sure that is wise? Look around you, Jack. Look at what you are _doing_."

Not quite trusting the Nightmare King, Jack glanced to where the dark spirit had gestured only briefly, but then turned to openly stare. Whilst he had been conversing with Pitch the ground around him had slowly been freezing solid, just as North's roof had, his powers acting without the need for a command from himself. He didn't _normally_ freeze everything he touched, such a power would make playing with children incredibly dangerous, and he had _never _unconsciously frozen something. Even when he had been at his most upset he had been fully aware of what he was doing, to not be so now was more than a little disconcerting, and he felt a sliver of unease settle in his stomach.

Unease, not fear, because he could not afford the latter.

"I'm redecorating," he said with a twist of his lips as he turned back to Pitch. "This décor is kind of bland, don't you think?"

"Bluster all you want, Jack." Pitch smiled indulgingly. "But I know more about you than you know about yourself. The power to control winter, what a heavy burden that must be. As for your offer." Pitch viewed his clenched fist thoughtfully, then shrugged. "Not tempting enough, I'm afraid. We're going to play a little game instead, Jack, and those children you care about so deeply are going to be the prize."

"Okay, fine." He hadn't really expected Pitch to agree to letting the children go, not after what had happened with Baby Tooth, but it was still disheartening to hear the Nightmare King refute his offer. Pushing that disappointment, and the strange, sudden independence of his powers, to the back of his mind Jack faced the Nightmare King squarely. "What game?"

"One you know quite well," Pitch answered him, still smiling that eerie smile. "Which is just as well, because you are going to need every advantage you can get." Jack merely scowled at him, which only amused the Nightmare King all the more. "Though, maybe I _am_ underestimating you," he said, an edge to his words that had Jack bracing before the next even came. "After all, you managed to save at least one child _before_ you became an immortal."

The words crashed into him like a wave over his head, and he stood for a moment, robbed of the ability to speak, before anger took over and he demanded harshly, "How did you know about that?"

"Really, Jack, you have to ask?" Pitch scoffed. "I had your memories with me for days. Do you really think I _didn't _look?"

"You had no _right_…!" Fury pulsed through him, and he was distantly aware of the energy surging inside of him, the crackling of his ice-lightning pooling in his hands in preparation for an all out attack.

"Jack, I really do think we are a bit beyond right and wrong, don't you?" Pitch reprimanded the Guardian. "And _do_ control yourself. This will be no fun at all if you skip to the ending before we've even begun."

Pinning the dark spirit with the blackest look he could muster, Jack reigned in his powers, but only because he knew what was at stake here. Pitch still had him at a disadvantage, and that disadvantage would not go away until Jamie and Sophie were back safely in Burgess with their mother. Thinking of the children's mother made Jack wince slightly, well aware that the fact the children were missing must surely have been noticed by now. The poor woman was likely frantic with worry, and she had every reason to be. Pitch may have been a spirit, but right now he was no less of a threat than a living being.

"That's better." Pitch nodded, stepping to the side and gesturing towards the cave entrance. "Now, then, to the matter of the children. They are both hidden somewhere inside my home, each in a separate location, each entirely unguarded. Find them, find your way back to the exit, and you are free to go."

"What, just like that?" Jack eyed the Nightmare King suspiciously, fully suspecting a trap. He had every reason to doubt Pitch's word. It had never held up in the past, and he doubted it would now. "You'll just let the three of us walk away?"

"You seem to think this game will be easy, Jack," Pitch responded with mocking confidence. "Believe me when I say it is not. And I would not linger here chatting too long if I were. You're on a clock, Frost, and when the timer ends…"

He let the sentence hang, though the implications were clear. Turning away from Pitch, Jack took a step towards the entrance then froze, swinging back around to face the Nightmare King.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked, honestly seeking an answer, because revenge was one thing, but this? This was something else entirely.

"You should know, _Jack_," the dark spirit answered with derision in his voice. "We are alike, you and I. I know it, and you know it, even if you won't admit."

"I would never hurt them," Jack shot back, unflinching.

Pitch simply smiled. "By choice? I do not believe you would. But you may not _have_ a choice, Jack."

With that enigmatic and alarming farewell, Pitch was gone, and Jack was left with nothing to do but go on, and pray that he could find and rescue the children before whatever dire deed Pitch had planned could rob him of that chance.

* * *

Jamie was in a world that consisted solely of darkness.

He could _see_ nothing. _Hear_ nothing. Not the drip of water. Not the echo of movement. Not even the slight whistle of air passing between stone walls. All was absolute silence, plunged in a blackness that went beyond natural darkness, and the only sense he had left to rely upon was touch. Everything he bumped against was cold, and not in the pleasant way that snow was cold or like how an ice cream stung the tongue. No, this was a deep cold that pierced right through his skin to the bones beneath, his hand snapping away from the stone almost as soon as he touched them.

He was lost, he knew that, and perhaps the wisest thing to do would have been to remain where he was until someone, one of the Guardians perhaps-they'd _know_ if he disappeared, wouldn't they?-came to find him. But Jamie couldn't do that, because he'd lost Sophie, after faithfully promising his mother that he would keep his sister safe. That had been the one condition of taking the little girl sledding with him, and he had given his _word_. He _had_ to find Sophie, no matter where he was or how scared he felt, he _had_ to find her.

"Sophie? Sophie, where are you?"

Just like it had the last ten times he had called, Jamie's voice echoed back at him, the only noise to break the unnatural stillness, and the only answer he had received since starting to look for his sister. There was nothing else to rely on to guide him but the sound of his sister's voice, because his surroundings were entirely black, and his eyes could not pierce the utter darkness. He was cold, he was blind, and he was _scared_, but most of all he was worried for his littler sister. She was only two, and he had _lost _her.

Guilt tugged at him, and, shivering slightly, he ran his hands up and down his arms, trying to restore warmth to the skin beneath the fabric of his shirt. He had barely noticed the cold when they first descended the steps that had brought them to this underground prison, enthralled by all the sights to see and the strange paintings on the wall that had drawn him right into the Boogeyman's trap. He hadn't even realized anything was wrong until something crashed into him and the flashlight struck the floor, because it was only once the light was gone that he had seen the Nightmares. It was then that he had lost Sophie, somewhere between scrabbling for the flashlight, which turned out to be broken, and dodging through the Nightmares' legs his sister had disappeared, and he had been looking for her ever since.

Jamie didn't know how long he had been down in this dark hole, but it seemed like hours, and exhaustion was starting to creep up on him. He refused to stop looking until he had found Sophie, but the reality was he could have been walking in circles for hours and not even know it. It was just so hard to _see_ anything down here.

"Hello?" he shouted again, despite the fact his voice was slowly growing raspier and raspier, thirst adding itself to the list of his discomforts. "Is anyone there? Sophie?...Jack?"

He didn't know why he had called for the winter spirit, except that Jack seemed to have a knack for showing up whenever he needed someone to talk to. Whenever he was feeling the slightest bit afraid, or even just when he wanted some company. This time, however, there was no familiar call in return, and the only answer he received was a silence so thick it seemed to smother him. Despair surged through him, and he slumped against the nearest wall, drawing his knees up and clutching the broken flashlight tightly to his chest.

Closing his eyes against the utter darkness around him, he tried to imagine what Jack would say if he was here. The encouragement the winter spirit would no doubt offer whilst hovering casually with his staff, lounging on one side as if he was lying on a sofa and not thin air whilst viewing Jamie with that confident smirk that always conveyed a challenge Jamie could not resist trying to conquer. That was what this was, he told himself firmly. Just another challenge. Just another game. And, when he reached the end, when he found Sophie, Jack would be there to congratulate him on a job well done, just as he always was.

Opening his eyes again he scrambled back to his feet, ignoring the tired ache of his overused muscles. He jiggled the flashlight one last time, hoping the device had somehow miraculously fixed itself, but when nothing happened he merely slipped the torch into his jacket pocket, shoving his hands in beside it in an effort to restore feeling to his numb fingers as he started walking again. He had barely taken two steps before a sudden rustle of movement caught his attention and he paused, turning in a slow circle.

"Sophie?" he paused, head cocked for an answer, then tried again. "Jack?"

This time an answer did come, but the speaker was far from welcome.

"He can't protect you, Jamie." The smooth voice made him jump away from the wall, and he darted to the middle of the corridor, turning around and around in an effort to spot the Nightmare King. He couldn't see Pitch anywhere, even though he recognized instantly to whom the voice belonged. But then, he couldn't see _anything_, so was it really any surprise that the darkness masked a shadow? "Not here."

"You can't do this, Pitch!" Jamie shouted back, proud of himself for not letting any of his fear show in his voice. "You can't keep me here! People are going to be looking for me!"

A dark laugh sounded all around him.

"They won't find you."

"They _will_," Jamie persisted, turning quickly, convinced the Nightmare King was right behind him. There was still no one there, though, just a gaping sort of emptiness that was almost scarier than Pitch himself. "The Guardians will find you."

"Ah, yes," Pitch answered smoothly. "There is that belief that got you into this mess in the first place. You should have stopped believing, Jamie, it would have been so much _easier_…"

Jamie whirled in panic, aware of the looming shadow behind him, a darker black against his ebony surroundings. He was too slow to avoid the sharp shove the Nightmare King gave him, and he let out a yelp of alarm as he tumbled down a slope he had not even seen in the darkness. Building momentum on the way down, he continued rolling for some distance even once the ground beneath him had flattened out, and he was decidedly dizzy by the time he finally came to a standstill and was able to push himself up on his forearms.

Invisible once more in the darkness, Pitch called to him, "I would stay still if I were you, Jamie Bennett. I would stay very, _very _still."

Jamie did not see Pitch fade away, but he felt the Nightmare King's presence fade, the added chill to the air abating. Breathing out a slow sigh of relief, hoping Pitch would find something else to keep him busy until Jamie had a chance to find Sophie and escape, the young boy began to rise. He made it all the way to his feet before the creak sounded, an ominous, deep groan beneath his feet as the substance under the soles of his shoes shifted slightly. Eyes widening, Jamie froze in place, sudden terror gripping him as he realized he was no longer atop solid ground.

Pitch had thrown him upon a frozen pool, and Jamie was, quite literally, standing on thin ice.


	9. Chapter 8: Missing

**A/N: Finally remembered what I was going to put in my last author's note. nimbi-piru on Deviantart drew some lovely fanfiction for this story-for the first chapter, I think it was. It was awesome. :-D  
**

**As for today's post, I'm a little bit iffy about this chapter. I don't know whether that's because I wrote it when I wasn't feeling well or what, I just don't like it as much as I have others. Last time I was all twitchy about a chapter and posted it anyway you guys seemed to like it, so here's to hoping it works out this time as well.**

**Read, review, and enjoy.  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox.  
**

**P.S: Please don't kill me. The chapter ended this way all by itself. IT WASN'T ME!  
**

**CHAPTER 8**

**-Missing-**

Bunny was the first out of the sleigh when they landed in Burgess, though North was a close second, right on the Easter Guardian's heels as he sprinted across the street. Tooth and Sandy shot off in the opposite direction, headed for the woods where Pitch's lair had last been seen, though all four Guardians were well aware the likelihood of any sign still being there were fairly slim. To North and Bunny, it was readily apparent that something was wrong even before they neared the Bennett house. The street was lined with cars, and even if neither of the Guardians paid much attention to the human world the official nature of several of the vehicles was impossible to miss. With a deep frown darkening his normally congenial features, North followed Bunny to the gap in the fence, peering through at the crowd assembled in the yard.

Mrs. Bennett was standing on the porch, one hand clenched into a fist and resting over her chest, the other gesturing as she spoke to two men in matching uniforms. North could not hear what they were talking about, the murmurings of the alarming number of adults gathered around the house's porch with flashlights and backpacks and maps drowning out the more distant conversation. North may not have been in the habit of paying much attention to the goings on in the adult human world, but the scene before him felt decidedly _wrong_.

"What is happening, Bunny?" he asked, unwilling to press his way through the crowd to find out despite the fact none of the people inside of it could see him.

Bunny waved his question away, standing with his head cocked, ears primed to hear everything said inside the overflowing house. North obliging fell silent, watching as the larger group began to split into teams as directed by the two official looking men, the children's mother remaining on the porch, watching the proceedings with clear trepidation.

"The kids are missing," Bunny reported darkly at last, confirming North's suspicions. "Have been since early this afternoon. That rotten excuse for an immortal has taken them."

There was obvious anger in his tone, fury, even, but North could not blame Bunny for that. This was not the first time Pitch had kidnapped children, though the last time had been centuries ago, and he had never attempted the same again. Until now. North had been just as furious then as Bunny was now, and it was only the knowledge that one of them needed to keep a level head that kept him from sharing that righteous anger. He opened his mouth, prepared to question the Easter Guardian further, but the abrupt buzz of fairy wings cut him off before he could utter a word.

"Did you find them?" Tooth blurted as soon as she reached them, Sandy following silently in her wake. "Are they here?"

"No," Bunny reported, his voice still conveying his displeasure with perfect clarity. "The kids are gone. Pitch kidnapped them."

"Gone?" Tooth questioned, uncertainty shining in her expression. "Gone how?"

"Missing," Bunny clarified. "For hours now. I'm telling you, Pitch has got them."

"You don't_ know_ that, Bunny." Tooth blanched, and North could read the desperate need in her eyes to believe her own words. "They can't even see him. They could just have gotten lost, or…or…"

"How do you think Pitch lured Jack away from the Pole?" the Guardian of Hope asked her bluntly. "I don't know how he managed it, but he has the kids, and now he has Frosty too."

Tooth's expression then was one of utter dismay, and North thought it prudent to intervene.

"Then _we_ must find Pitch," he declared firmly, turning to the Guardian of Dreams as he added, "Sandy?"

The small Guardian nodded in determination, forming a sand cloud as he took to the sky, dream weaves breaking off in all directions. Sandy could find any child in the world if they were sleeping, but North feared that the chances of either Bennett child being asleep were very slim. Pitch had to know they could trace the kids that way. He would have taken precautions.

"Why didn't Jack wait for us?" Bunny demanded suddenly, finally giving voice to the frustrations that had no doubt been stewing inside his mind since before they left the Pole. "Or at least ask the Yetis for help! But no, the gumby had to go and bloody well _sneak_ out of the Pole on his own. He was all but _asking_ for Pitch to try something like this!"

"Is problem," North replied somberly, not at all surprised by the outburst. Bunny had a habit of lashing out verbally when things started to go wrong, and this particular situation was deteriorating at a frighteningly rapid rate. Months. That was all it had been. A few _months_, and yet Pitch had somehow conjured a plan that had left them lagging at his heels, struggling to counter every move he made. Jack's recklessness wasn't helping, but North didn't really think any of them could blame the winter spirit for trying to do his duty as a Guardian. Absentmindedly, he added, "We should drum out of him."

"Heh, good luck with that, mate," Bunny replied, not bothering to mask his skepticism, unlike his worry, which was nevertheless not as concealed as the Easter Guardian seemed to think. "Besides, you need to find the brat first."

"What about hole by lake?" inquired North, turning to the Guardian of Memories.

"We looked," Tooth answered quickly, for both Sandy and herself. "If Pitch's lair is still there, the entrance isn't visible anymore. "

"Besides, Jack may be reckless, but he ain't stupid," said Bunny, reluctantly conceding that much. "He wouldn't go down that hole again."

"If given choice, perhaps," North mused, rubbing his chin in deep thought. "What if forced?"

"_Forced_?" Bunny snorted. "Frosty? Are you serious, mate?"

"He doesn't have his staff," Tooth recalled fearfully.

"Well, he still has his attitude," Bunny pointed out. "That should be more than enough of a weapon."

"When Pitch has kids?" North shook his head. "We all would be defenseless."

Turning away from the Bennett house, he fished around in his coat for another snowglobe and began to make his way back to the sleigh and the impatiently waiting reindeer.

"Come," he ordered. "We go check globe. See if we can find Jamie and Sophie."

"And if Jack isn't with them?" the Easter Guardian prompted dubiously.

"One step at time, Bunny," North told him. "One step at time."

* * *

Jack had come to Pitch's lair fully expecting a fight. With Pitch. With his Nightmares. With his illusions. With _whatever _dangers the Nightmare King had chosen to line his lair with. He had gotten that fight, but rather than facing Pitch's minions he instead found himself battling his own powers, a conflict that was far more difficult, and with stakes just as high.

He had never stopped to consider what purpose his staff served. He knew he needed it for flight, and that his creations were always much more precise when he used the conduit, and he had known with absolute certainty after Pitch broke it the first time that he was connected to the item. But he didn't know what it _did_. The Man in the Moon had never bothered to explain the exact nature of his powers to him, leaving him to figure it out on his own, with, it may be said, sometimes-disastrous results. Mastering his abilities had been hard enough as it was without trying to figure out the exact purpose of his staff, and once he had had his powers in hand he hadn't given much thought to those of the conduit. That was, apparently, his mistake.

How Pitch had known what would happen if the staff was not repaired within a reasonable amount of time Jack did not know, but the Nightmare King had used that knowledge well. It was taking most of Jack's concentration just to keep his abilities in check as he traversed the inner workings of Pitch's hideout, boxing them behind a figurative wall that failed completely to fill the void his staff had left inside of him. And whenever he tried to use them, to add a little glowing frost to the tunnel to light his way, it was like trying to use a tap that would only allow you to set it to either full blast or nothing at all. Trying to restrict that flow _hurt_, but he had persisted nonetheless, knowing all too well the dangers of doing nothing.

Jack knew full well that winter could kill.

Shoving that morbid thought from his mind he let his eyes wander over his dully illuminated surroundings, trying to distract himself from the growing ache in his chest. Pitch really wasn't one for decorating, and the tunnels consisted largely of sable walls and deceptive shadows that stretched across the floor and the ceiling and constantly had Jack second guessing whether he had just seen a Nightmare or a harmless lack of light. The quiet was disconcerting as well, utter and complete. Even the South Pole, cold and inhospitable to most as it was, was not entirely silent, and the sheer lack of sound now surrounding him was clearly unnatural.

It was something of a relief, then, when that silence was broken.

His troubles momentarily forgotten, Jack honed in on the sound of soft crying, darting down one tunnel and then the next, pursuing the sound as surely as a greyhound would chase a rabbit. Smirking slightly at that errant thought, he braked, retracing his steps to the intersection where the path he had chosen had drawn him further from the sound. Choosing another, he continued doggedly, eyes flashing from the left to the right until he finally pinpointed the source of the sound.

Sophie had hidden herself away in a small recess in the wall, her tiny form folded up in the equally miniscule space, her face buried in her knees and her body rocking back and forth as she cried. Jack approached her slowly, crouching just outside the hole and making no move to enter her sanctuary. He took the time to spread a light layer of glowing frost all around the hollow, lightening their surroundings, and only once the light was bright enough to be a mildly cheerful glow did he choose to speak.

"Sophie, you okay in there?"

The little girl stiffened at the sound of his voice, lifting her head and peering through her long locks up at him. It took only a moment for recognition to kick in, and then suddenly she was in his arms, burying her face in his hoodie as she continued to cry.

"Jack!"

"Hey, kiddo," he whispered softly, holding her tightly against him. "You're okay now. I gotcha."

"Jamie gone, Jack." Pushing herself away from his chest, the little girl looked up at him tearfully, sniffing slightly as she wiped at her eyes. "Can't find Jamie. I want Jamie."

"We'll find him, don't worry," Jack reassured her, glancing around nervously.

Pitch had said this wouldn't be easy, and yet Sophie had not been hidden. It was as if the Nightmare King had just let her run loose around his lair, not caring where she ended up. That thought troubled Jack for some reason, and he pondered it for several moments before realizing _why_. Pitch hadn't bothered trying to endanger Sophie because it wasn't the little girl who had stood up to him, it had been _Jamie_.

Prompted by that thought, Jack rose to his feet, shifting Sophie's weight onto his hip as he did so. "How about we go find you're brother right now, kiddo?" he suggested, keeping his voice light. "It'll be just like hide-and-seek."

Sophie, despite eyeing the dark passageway distrustfully, gave a hesitant nod. "Okay."

Forcing a smile full of confidence he did not really feel, Jack started walking again, keeping both his mounting fear and his restless powers firmly under lock and key. Sophie was safe and sound now, and he swore Jamie would be too in just a little while. He could worry about himself once they were home and safe. He could last that long.

He hoped.

* * *

The ice was melting.

Jamie hadn't noticed it at first, what with trying to stay as still as possible and wondering if just _walking_ off the pond would work, but as the amount of light flooding into the cavern slowly began to increase-and _why_ was it brightening? What did Pitch want to be seen?-and the continuous soft creak around him told him something was very, _very_ wrong eventually he couldn't help but turn around ever so slowly and carefully to stare at the center of the pool. It was only then that he realized how lucky he was _not_ to have ended up sliding into the very middle.

The ice was breaking apart, starting in the center but steadily spreading outwards. He could just barely see shards that had fractured and were now drifting apart, fathomless, black water revealed in the cracks that were slowly enlarging between them. Gulping slightly, he turned back to face away from the impending danger, his eyes tracing the seemingly safe, smooth ice that would lead him back to solid ground.

If he didn't fall through it first.

Holding his breath, he took a slow step forward, cringing as the ice groaned beneath his weight. With infinite care he removed his other foot from the slippery surface, standing on one leg and putting his arms out to the side for balance. Nothing happened, and, feeling his courage rise a little, Jamie took another step.

The ice cracked with a suddenness that had him all but falling backwards in his haste to avoid the enormous fracture that suddenly appeared beneath the sole of his shoe. He landed back where he had been standing before, and watched in mounting fear as the piece of ice on which he now found himself slowly floated away from the rest of the frozen covering.

_No. Nonononono._

Frantically, hoping to paddle his way back to the main sheet, Jamie dipped a hand in the water, only to withdraw it immediately when he found it bitingly cold to touch. Even with the ice atop breaking apart the water below was still unbearable frigid, leaving him helpless to do anything but sit in the middle of his small, floating patch of ice and hope that it would not simply melt away beneath him.

Even amidst his growing panic, Jamie sensed instantly the moment when Pitch returned. His presence came with a decided chill to the air that had nothing to do with the cold, and even had that not been indicator enough, smooth laughter preceded him. Still lying as absolutely still as possible, Jamie nonetheless twisted his body just enough to throw a glare in the general direction of the Nightmare King, the glow of yellow eyes the only sign to tell him where the dark spirit was.

"Can you swim, Jamie?" Pitch asked disinterestedly, floating on a cloud of Nightmare Sand as he watched more slabs of ice break away from the larger fragment.

Jamie didn't answer, his gaze traveling unwittingly to the black waters below him. He _could_ swim, was even considered a strong swimmer for his age, but it had been emphasized time and time again in Burgess the dangers of trying to do so in cold water. And _this_ water was more than just cold, it was _freezing_.

"Jamie!"

Startled out of his thoughts by the familiar cry, Jamie turned at the sound of his sister's voice, instantly espying the little girl where she rested in Jack's arms, the pair of them standing at the edge of the pond, just where stone turned to icy frozen water. Hope surged through him, and he caught himself grinning in giddy relief, though that smile faded somewhat when he observed the absolutely petrified look on Jack's face. But before he could say a word, before he could so much as utter the Guardian's name, the shard of ice upon which he was lying tipped suddenly, and with a cry of alarm Jamie plunged straight into the icy cold depths.

**A/N 2: I'm just going to go hide now. That definitely seems like a good idea. Yep. Hiding. In a bunker. :-D**


	10. Chapter 9: Frozen

**A/N: *sneaks out of bunker and posts chapter early to avoid fans with atomic weapons*  
:-D**

**Hey, everybody. Internet coverage for the past couple of days has been sketchy, so I'm posting this eight or so hours early while my interweb is actually working. :-)  
**

**Also, I watched Rise of the Guardians in 3D at the cinema recently, and whilst everybody else has already picked all the little details apart there was something I noticed I just felt like sharing. Beware the Book Spoilers ahead:  
**

**In Toothiana's book, Punjam Hy Loo (I'm going by memory, that could be spelt wrong), the city where she lives is in ruins and partially overgrown by the jungle. There is nothing sparkly or pretty, it is all aged and worn stone. Presumably, her being a Guardian and the belief of children allows the city to return to its former glory, but if you look closely when Pitch makes the children STOP believing what is UNDERNEATH all that pretty is bland, gray, WORN stone. The ruins of Punjam Hy loo. Neat, huh?  
**

**Aaaand, I also have a question which nobody will probably be able to answer. In the books, the village where Ombric, North, and Katherine live is called Santoff Claussen, and I'm fairly certain (being too lazy to look it up)it is stated as being in Siberia. And yet, in a lot of fanfictions I've read, North's factory, the North Pole, is referred to as Santoff Claussen. Now, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but North actually built a NEW city at the Pole, it's not the same as the little village, and therefore is not Santoff Claussen. So, is there a canonical REASON people are referring to the factory by that name, or have they just got them mixed up?  
**

**CHAPTER 9**

**-Frozen-**

It wasn't the sight of Jamie atop the frozen pond that caused Jack to freeze in his tracks.

It wasn't even the fact that the ice was breaking apart.

It had nothing to do with Pitch, hovering in the background with a smile of pure triumph on his face even as he faded away into the blackness, leaving them to their fates.

It was because he didn't _see_ Jamie at all, but his own sister, and for one, terrifying moment he was back on that lake, the ice breaking beneath him, and he remembered the cold, and the dark, and the _fear_. He remembered falling, plunging _down, down, down_ too swiftly to even process what was happening, and the way the gelid water had stripped away his will and strength to _fight it_. He remembered dying, _drowning_, the part of his death that had been buried safely away in the past where it could not touch his mind in the present suddenly at the forefront. The memory momentarily paralyzed him, and it was in that moment that things went terribly, _horribly _wrong.

Jamie's cry startled him out of his trance, and Jack was moving even before his mind had fully processed what had happened.

"Stay here!" he ordered firmly, placing the newly terrified Sophie down at a safe distance from the frozen lake, before all but sprinting out onto the black surface.

Jack's weight didn't break the ice, his powers made sure of that, though the frozen liquid did creak briefly beneath his feet, hairline fractures spreading out from the point of each footstep before they rapidly vanished as his talent came into play and his presence instead acted as a bolster to the thin ice beneath him. The fact his abilities prevented him from taking a dunking was no comfort at all, however, in the face of the horrible truth that Jamie had not been so lucky. Cursing Pitch under his breath, Jack hastened towards where he could see Jamie struggle to remain afloat in what was surely frigid water, but stopped immediately when the patch of ice beneath him began to spread, realization sweeping over him in chilling waves.

If he got near Jamie, he could very easily trap the boy _beneath_ the water, or half _in _it. Ever since he had emerged from the frozen lake in which he perished he had not been able to submerge himself in water again. He could drink. He could cry. But any body of water bigger than a glass froze over the moment he made contact. Puddles. Pools. Lakes. It didn't matter, they all reacted exactly the same when brought into his proximity. If he had had his staff in his possession, it would not have been an issue. He could have easily fished Jamie out, or, failing that, have reigned his abilities in long enough to help him onto solid ice. As it was he was powerless. He daren't risk drawing nearer, but if he did _nothing_…

Jack had never _not_ wanted his powers. There had been times when he had hated what he was capable of. When the truth that his cold nature would only ever be welcomed by a very few and in small doses only had worn heavily on his spirit, but he had never wished to be powerless. In that moment, however, trapped immobile atop the half frozen, inky black pool, he had never wished for anything more.

"Jack!" Jamie's desperate cry tore him from his thoughts, and he lifted his gaze to the flailing boy once more. "Help!"

That decided it, Jack resolved abruptly as he straightened in determination. Staff or no staff, he was going to make his powers _do_ what he _wanted_ them to do. Jamie was _not_ going to drown. Not on his watch. Taking a deep breath, Jack turned his focus inwards, reigning the energy he commanded in tightly and boxing it away behind whatever figurative walls he could construct. He had a feeling that, had his staff been in his hands, those walls would already be in place, but his weapon of choice was not available for the time being, and he was forced to improvise.

Improvising, it turned out, was an incredibly painful experience.

The energy he restrained coiled inside of him, pulsing and thrashing, desperate to be released. His muscles trembled beneath an onslaught that came from _within _him, and his head pounded in tandem with the throb of power inside of him. A power that longed to escape. To work its artful, _deadly_ magic. Jack forced himself to ignore the pain even as he doubled over beneath its onslaught, closing his eyes and focusing on remaining _calm_, knowing that the only thing his abilities needed to gain free rein once more was the slightest hint of negative emotion.

When the results came, they came suddenly, and he plunged through the weakened ice beneath his feet, sinking like an anvil. Panic surged briefly at being underwater once again, a place he had not lingered in for _three hundred years_, and the memory of the _cold-dark-fear_ bounded about inside his head. But the recollection of Jamie's terrified face was enough to banish the older memory, and he forcefully tampered down his own anxiety as soon as he saw the ice crystals forming around him, knowing what was at stake here. The price to be paid should he fail.

His feet touched the bottom of the pool at last, and, determinedly _not_ thinking of the depths of water above and all around him, Jack peered upwards through the gloom. The water was entirely opaque, blacker than black and impossible to see through. He could only guess at Jamie's exact location, but knowing where the boy was would not affect what he needed to do next. Closing his eyes again, resisting the urge to take a deep breath, Jack cautiously tapped into his entrapped powers, ripping away the bars he had created and, in a matter of seconds, _freezing_ the pool from the bottom up.

The ice lifted him from the floor of the plash to the newly frozen surface, pushing Jamie upwards as though he weighed nothing at all, and leaving him to sprawl atop the now meters thick layer of ice. Jack, for his part, collapsed on the completely frozen pool, gasping for breath and clutching reflexively at his chest. He was vaguely aware of the fact he had frozen not only the water but also the walls and a good portion of the ceiling above as well, but none of that seemed overly important alongside the terrified youngster lying only a few feet away.

"Jamie!"

Sophie, no longer able to remain still and quiet, darted out across the frozen pool, slipping and sliding wildly until she finally collided with her brother, wrapping her arms about him in a bone crushing embrace. Hauling himself exhaustedly into an upright position, Jack almost moved closer to the pair, before reminding himself that Jamie was soaked and Sophie was now probably at least half as wet. His chill would do nothing to alleviate their discomfort, it would only make things worse. With that in mind he kept his distance, hovering near enough to be able to study them both, but not close enough to touch.

"Are you alright, Jamie?"

The water dripping from the boy's hair was not quite enough to hide his tears, and he managed little more than a tight, mute nod in response. Sophie was buried in his chest, sobbing loudly, and Jack had the feeling Jamie would not be able to pry his sister away from his side any time soon. The two of them must be freezing, but he had no way of keeping them warm, and the best he could do to help them was to keep away. Eyes not leaving the pair, he folded himself meekly into the corner of the pit and tried not to freeze anything more than he already had. His chest was _burning_, the energy he had trapped inside chafing on the restraints hurriedly put in place once Jamie was safe, and it was all he could do to resist rubbing the affected area.

He didn't want to scare Jamie or Sophie, however, so he held himself rigidly still, closing his eyes as he leant his head against the side of the chamber, hoping that Baby Tooth had found her way safely back to the North Pole. That the Guardians were on their way. That _someone _was coming to save them.

Because he didn't think he could get them out of this alone.

* * *

It was fortunate indeed that Tooth's job had long since ceased requiring her presence in the field. The fairy was so distracted she would have been more hindrance than help to her hundreds of little helpers. As it was she was having difficulty in the simple task of relaying her instructions correctly, her attention, normally divided between multiple tasks, now stretched to breaking point.

She was not alone in this, either, North observed. Bunny, who had stood for almost an hour leaning against a pillar as he painted the same egg over and over again, always finding some fault with his work, had given up in the end and was now hopping back and forth across the room, wearing a figurative hole in North's grand, red carpet, and trampling elves as he went. North himself wasn't faring much better, having already bitten the heads off a couple of hapless Yetis, and resorted to simply _kicking_ whatever elves were underfoot clear of his path.

Out of all of the Guardians, Sandy alone seemed calm, settled by a large open window with his eyes closed and long rivers of dream sand drifting away on the breeze. North envied the Guardian of Dreams his ability to stay still, but couldn't begrudge Sandy the distraction his task gave him. They _all_ needed something to pull their minds away from their current predicament.

Searching a globe that offered no true identifying marks for two children amongst _millions_ was a truly daunting task. Jamie's light had always been bright, a beacon easily spotted, but for some reason it was dulled today, indistinguishable from the thousands of others, and North could feel his internal frustration building with each roadblock he and his comrades smacked into. Jack and the Bennetts hadn't vanished into thin air. They had to be _somewhere_, but finding out where was proving to be ridiculously difficult. He had even tried to coax a snowglobe into taking them to their wintery friend, but the globes responded better to locations than moving targets, and had dumped them without ceremony back on Jack's lake.

They were, in a word, stuck, and the frustration boiling within his great frame was not a feeling North particularly enjoyed. It was impossible to be joyous, jolly, and wondrous when his feelings were so soured, and he blamed Pitch entirely for his current bad mood. Actually, he felt fairly confident he could blame Pitch for _everything _amiss at the moment, and it only rubbed all the more to know that, whatever the Nightmare King was trying to achieve, they had once more played right into his hands.

He was not angry at Jack for doing whatever he had done to protect the children, though he did wish the boy had taken the time to find _them_ first, or at the very least get _someone _to help him. But the sad truth was that it had probably not even occurred to the winter spirit to seek aid. Jack had been relying on himself for too long because that had been the only thing he _could_ rely on, and it was not a habit that was going to be easy to break. The winter spirit was more liable to see people trying to stand in his way as an enemy than actually concerned for his welfare, especially when 'standing in his way' consisted of blocking him from going immediately to the aid of his first believer. The youngest Guardian was still learning what it meant to be part of a team, part of a _family_, and it was unfortunate indeed that, when he had needed them the most, they had failed to be there.

It was a mistake they would rectify, North was determined, and with that oath in mind he turned back to surveying the globe, hoping for a miracle that he knew full well may never come.

* * *

Pitch was well aware that Jack had not been lying those few months ago when he had told the Nightmare King that he did not fear him, and that lack of fear had posed a problem in forming the connection he needed to implant the final trigger. The illusion that would tip Jack's tenuous control over the brink it now teetered on. He had known the doorway he required into a mind that was adamantly closed to him would not be easy to open. A mere flicker of alarm was not enough to ground a tether, and he had had to invest a great deal of time in arranging a setting that would give him the moment of weakness he needed.

A moment to seal the fate of all the Guardians.

How ridiculously easy it was.

Because they had _made _it easy.

The Guardians had always been too complacent in their roles. Too ready to believe all was well in the world even when a tempest was brewing all around them. Pitch had hidden his surviving presence from them many times in the past to their detriment, and they had not learned from any of those lessons. Perhaps they expected him to give up after so many failures. Perhaps they believed enough defeats on his part would cause him to abandon his cause. To let go of this quest that had been driving him ever since he came to this pitiful little world. But Pitch would not and _could_ not let it go. He refused to be seen as the one who had lost. No matter how long it took, he would be called _victor_.

And was it not fittingly ironic the Guardians had allowed it to be so? That was a fact he meant to rub in their faces as soon as they arrived, stirring the pot of brewing guilt and anger he was sure must already be boiling. Oh, yes, the Guardians were well aware of how utterly they had failed where Jack Frost was concerned. Pitch had sensed those negative emotions even from afar, and had laughed to himself at their naivety in thinking that they could somehow mend what had been broken for almost three hundred years. They did not yet realize that the failure they had been orchestrating for so long was not yet complete, and that it was here, in the very heart of _his_ world, that their last chance to save their friend would fade away into the abyss.

Casting an illusion over a Guardian's mind was no easy feat, even for such a master of the art as Pitch was. Just as the Guardians' gifts of Dreams, Hopes, and Wonders had a diminished affect when used on their fellow spirits, so, too, was Pitch's own more subtle works undermined by the natural resilience of the Guardians to his trickery. But Jack had already proved more vulnerable to his powers than most, the affect of his words on that dark Easter Sunday had proven that much, and the Nightmare King knew full well that, no matter how impervious the mental wall about the Guardian of Fun might seem, there were, without a doubt, cracks to exploit.

All _he_ had to do was make them wide enough.

Doing so was not easy, and required a feather light touch that would go unnoticed when stealth meant _everything_. For that very reason, he had chosen _not_ to interfere in the little disaster unfolding beneath his floating cloud of nightmare sand, and had shrunk instead into the shadows to watch the scene the moment he was certain it would play out just as he had planned it. It had been tempting, _incredibly_ tempting, to take the unmasked horror on Jack's face and twist it and turn it into something far worse. But doing so would have put the teenage immortal on his guard when the Nightmare King had needed the winter spirit thinking about anything but the fact Pitch could possibly pose a danger.

He had needed an opening, and he had found it.

It only took a second to plant the darkness in the corner of the youngest Guardian's mind, something so small as to seem harmless. In truth, the darkness itself _was_ harmless, it was the spider web thin line that connected that miniscule amount of shadow with Pitch himself that made it a danger. He had his leverage now, a string between master and marionette, and, very soon now, Jack would dance upon that string like the puppet he had unknowingly become.

Pitch was ready to put on his show.

All he needed now was an audience.

* * *

Shocked and terrified in the wake of his near death experience, Jamie Bennett cradled his young sister closer against his chest, trying not to think about those terrible few moments when he hadn't been able to keep his head above the water. When he had almost _drowned_. Jack had lifted him out in the nick of time, and, even if he hadn't been able to verbally thank the Guardian, he was certain Jack must know how grateful he was that the immortal was here with them.

Jamie knew it had been a _choice_ for Jack to come. The Guardian of Fun hadn't _needed_ to be here. Hadn't needed to risk himself for their sake. It had been Jamie's mistake. His foolish curiosity that got both he and his sister into this. But Jack had come anyway. Because he was a Guardian. Because protecting children was what a Guardian was sworn to do. Because that was what Jack Frost _did_, and Jamie couldn't have been more grateful for the fact that Jack was here, _with _him, to fight against Pitch.

He had once claimed he was not afraid of the Boogeyman, and that was true, or it had been right up until Pitch lured him down here. Even now, though, he wasn't really scared of Pitch. He was scared of this place. This dark hole. And he was grateful, again, for the illumination provided by the glowing frost patterns adorning the wall and roof above them, even if they came with an added bite to the air.

He could not help but be frightened, then, when all of a sudden the glow vanished.

"Jack?"

Jamie's voice was a mere tremor in the absolute darkness around them, and he jumped slightly when it echoed back at him, Sophie, still clinging to his side, whimpering slightly as he did so.

"It's okay, Soph," he promised, even though he wasn't really sure it _was_ okay.

The two of them had been _kidnapped_. By the _Boogeyman_. Had that ever happened before? He knew kids disappeared sometimes. He had seen it on the news. But that was the work of bad people, not bad spirits. His mom wouldn't know what to look for. How to find them. Their only chance was to get out of here by themselves, and the only way they were going to do that was if Jack helped them. But Jack wasn't answering him, and he could barely even see the winter spirit where he sat huddled in the corner, not even the sound of his breathing breaking the silence.

"Jack?" he whispered this time, trying not to create an echo as he slowly, cautiously shifted across the ice, dragging Sophie with him. Once he was within reach he outstretched a hand and shook the Guardian's arm slightly. When that didn't garner a response, he placed his hands on Jack's side and shook his whole body. "Jack, _wake up_!"

Sophie had started to cry again, burying her face in his sleeve, and Jamie was sure he was not the only one shivering. They couldn't stay here. It was far too cold. Sophie was only two years old. A baby, really. She could get sick so much easier than he could, and he was already feeling miserable.

"Jack," he tried again, his voice a near whine. "_Please_, wake up."

For a terrifying moment nothing happened, then Jack stirred slightly, coughing dryly as his head rolled away from the wall and he blinked owlishly across at Jamie.

"Hey, kiddo. You okay?"

Jamie nodded mutely, wrapping an arm about his still sobbing sister, unable to muster any words. He_ knew_ there was something wrong with Jack, but he wasn't quite sure he dared ask what. Instead he watched in silence as Jack cautiously pushed himself upright from his leaning position, curling his legs beneath him as he took a quick glance about their surroundings, before focusing on Jamie and Sophie once more.

"Jack?" Sitting down on the ice, drawing Sophie to himself and trying not to let his teeth chatter audibly, Jamie asked, "Why is Pitch doing this?"

"Because he's angry, Jamie," Jack answered softly, watching both him and Sophie indecisively. "Have you ever done something bad when you were angry and then regretted it later?"

Jamie considered briefly, then gave a reluctant nod.

"Well, then, that's why Pitch is doing this," Jack explained, rising somewhat shakily to his feet, using the wall to brace himself. "Except I don't think he's going to regret it."

"Because he's a bad person, right?" Jamie asked, clambering upright and trying not to stagger under Sophie's weight. He would have given her to Jack, but they were both sopping wet and already half frozen. That, combined with the winter spirit's cold skin, was only inviting trouble. At least this way they could keep each other warm. Sort of.

"Maybe." Jack frowned, seeming to consider something. "I don't think he was always bad, but things happened and he sort of turned out that way in the end."

Jamie didn't really understand what that meant, but he didn't ask for Jack to explain further, his attention distracted by his realization of what was amiss with his friend's appearance, _besides_ the fact he looked like he was about to fall over any second.

"Jack?" he asked, causing the Guardian to pause on his way across the pool to glance back at him.

"Yeah, buddy?"

Teeth still chattering, Jamie nonetheless managed to make his next words audible. "Where's your staff?"

Jack was silent for a moment, his expression oddly closed off, before confessing lightly, "I had a bit of an accident. It's sort of in more than one piece at the moment."

"Oh." Jamie frowned. "How did that happen?"

"Oh, you know." Jack's tone was a little _too_ cheerful, and Jamie's scowl deepened, the boy certain the Guardian was not being entirely honest with him. "The usual reckless, unGuardian-like stuff."

Pondering that, Jamie set a wriggling Sophie down on her feet, choosing to hold her hand as an alternative method of maintaining contact.

"Pitch broke it, didn't he?" he guessed.

"Nothing gets past you, does it, squirt?" Jack laughed softly as he turned back to picking his way across the ice, and Jamie drew comfort from the warm sound, not caring if the winter spirit was only acting so upbeat for his benefit. "Let that be a lesson for you to never share your toys with the Boogeyman."

Jamie grinned at his friend's words despite his worries for their present situation, trudging along behind the Guardian as Jack moved carefully across the surface of the frozen pool. He sincerely hoped Jack knew where he was going, because Jamie had been lost a long while _before _he had even ended up atop the water, and so he was both happy and deeply concerned when the Guardian of Fun reached out and pushed his hand right _through_ one of the walls.

"Um." Uncertainly watching as Jack retracted his limb, relieved to see it was still _intact_, Jamie questioned his friend's intentions. "What is _that_?"

"A door, I _think_," Jack responded with a decidedly _uncomforting _lack of confidence. "The entrance I came in was exactly the same. It's kind of like a spider's web. All clingy and stretchy, but, you know, it lets you through."

"Is it safe?" It didn't _look_ safe. Doors weren't meant to _eat_ people, _or_ limbs, and, as Jack pushed his hand through the strange, black substance a second time, Jamie could not help but liken it to exactly that; A door consuming the Guardian of Fun's hand.

"It's perfectly safe," the winter spirit reassured him. "I'm still here, aren't I?"

After a moment's consideration, Jamie gave a reluctant nod.

"So….Onwards, I guess," Jack said with a shrug, turning away from the strange opening and back to Jamie with only the smallest traces of a grin showing on his face as he extended a hand. "Shall we see what's on the other side?"

Jamie wanted to reply with confidence, without the slightest trace of the fear he felt, but something was trapped in his throat and the best he could manage was a slight nod as he reached out, took the winter spirit's hand, and followed him into the shadows.

**A/N2: And look, no cliffhanger! (I'd make the most of it if I was you, -D)**


	11. Chapter 10: The Coming Storm

**A/N: Guys...I have 186 reviews. ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY SIX. That's like...like fourteen away from two hundred. One hundred and fifty ****_more_**** than my old review record. ****_One hundred and eighty six! _****On a story that was actually a Christmas present for my little sister and only got posted here as an afterthought! I am just so confused right now, in a happy, overwhelmed kinda way. 8-)**

**Aaaand, while we're on the subject of reviews, I'd like to give a big shout out to all the guest reviewers. I feel like I've kinda been neglecting you guys, so just know that I appreciate ALL my reviewers, gray-faced of not. You guys are all equally awesome in my book. :-)**

**Read, review, and enjoy!**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 10**

**-Coming Storm-**

Three and a half hours after the Guardians discovered Jack was missing, Tooth fled the globe room in a fit of fury after ranting uselessly at an all too silent Man in the Moon. Bunny could well understand the fairy's frustration with Manny's silence, but the Guardians were well used by now to dealing with things on their own, and none of them had honestly expected their leader to intervene or answer their attempts to call upon him. The Man in the Moon very rarely did, and even then only under the most dire of circumstances.

Honestly, Bunny felt a little insulted this situation was not considered dire.

Three and a half hours, the majority of which had been spent at the Pole fruitlessly scouring the globe over and over in the hopes they would see something they had not before, and they still had nothing. Not even Sandy's seeking sand weaves had found any sign of their missing comrade, and they were swiftly running out of places to look. Frustrated did not even _begin_ to explain how he felt right now, and he barely had to exchange a glance with North before the both of them moved to follow after Tooth, leaving the Yetis and Sandy to continue searching.

They found the female guardian in Jack's room, seated on the bed with the small chest containing the remains of the winter spirit's staff resting in her lap, her shoulders hunched and her head bowed. None of her fairies were with her, all of them needed to continue the duty of collecting teeth, and she looked strangely bereft without a single one of the sprites hovering nearby. North moved across the room to join the fairy on the bed whilst Bunny took up a post beside the door, watching his fellow Guardians warily.

"You alright, Toothy?" North inquired gently, the bed sinking beneath his massive weight.

"He told me it wasn't Pitch's fault," the Guardian of Memories whispered. "That the only reason Pitch tried to hurt him was because we'd stopped Pitch from having what we had. That he _understood_ why Pitch did what he did. How…" She faltered momentarily, before lifting her head and staring first at North and then at Bunny. "How alone do you have to _be_ to _understand_ why someone would want to create a world where every child lives in fear?"

North and Bunny exchanged an uneasy glance, the Easter Guardian speaking first, "Tooth…"

"I know," she interrupted him fiercely, wiping raggedly at her eyes. "I _know_ that we're trying to fix that mistake now. That none of us realized at the time how _cruel_ we were being. But I still…I still feel like we failed him for three hundred years, and now we're failing him all over again." She paused, but only momentarily, anger threading its way atop the grief in her words as she said, "And what of the Man in the Moon? He _created_ Jack! Doesn't he have a _responsibility _to care for him? Why isn't he _doing _anything?"

"You know Manny does not work like that," North reminded her, sounding slightly displeased about the fact he himself was pointing out. "He never has, Tooth."

"Well, maybe he _should_," the fairy argued adamantly. "He doesn't have to do much. He just needs to _tell us_ where Jack _is_."

"Maybe he doesn't know," Bunny interjected soberly. "Pitch _has_ hidden from him before."

"Then how are we going to find him?" Tooth demanded desperately, her fingers tightening around the box in her lap. "How are we going to find Jamie and Sophie? How are we going to _be_ Guardians?"

"An answer will come," the Christmas Guardian insisted, still devoutly optimistic. Bunny's own hope on that count was dwindling, but with Tooth already looking so depressed he didn't think it prudent to mention his doubts aloud. Heaving a silent sigh, he turned to return to the globe room, hopping back quickly when the door swung open and Sandy barreled in, excitement making the short Guardian's face all but glow.

"Sandy? What is…" North began, but got no further as Tooth almost ran him over in her haste to get to the door.

"Baby Tooth!" Seizing the little fairy out of the air Tooth clutched her miniature tightly against her chest for several moments before giving Baby Tooth room to breathe. "What happened?" she asked quickly. "Where were you? Where's Jack?"

Baby Tooth chattered a response, to one or all of the questions Bunny could not tell, and Tooth listened intently before turning to her fellow Guardians with a look of complete and utter determination.

"Baby Tooth knows where Jack is," she told them. "Come on." There was something decidedly intimidating about the way she spoke her next words. "We're _going_ to get him back."

* * *

The blast of heat that hit Jack when he emerged from the inky wall was an unwelcome addition to the many afflictions his body was already freely protesting against. Somewhat dazed by the sudden change in temperature, and not at all comfortable with the warmth now encasing him and the two children at his heels, Jack swayed slightly, standing in place as he took the time to study his new surroundings.

The chamber they were currently standing in was a massive circle, the wall they had come through just one part of its curving perimeter. A line of thick, standing columns formed an inner ring inside the outermost loop in which they stood, and the floor beyond the line the pillars formed was marked by paler stone, strange runes and twisted images breaking the monotony. There were also Nightmares present, a surprising number of them, slinking in and out from between the pillars.

Stepping away from both Sophie and Jamie, who were no doubt enjoying the stifling heat a great deal more than he, Jack sent his frost trails streaming out across the room, shedding light on what was only shadow. His glittering ice patterns spread out in all directions along the stone floor, converging on the center of the room, where their path ended abruptly when they collided against a blackness that would not yield.

He had found his adversary.

"Are you enjoying yourself, Jack?" Pitch's voice echoed across the distance between them, the expression on the Nightmare King's face indistinguishable where he stood in the void.

"You shouldn't ask questions you don't want the answer to, Pitch," Jack snapped back, clenching his fists and ignoring the slight crackle that sounded as a result, ice having formed on his skin as anger fueled the instability of his powers. The temperature in the room was almost smothering him, but his frost did not melt, held in place by the excess energy he was just barely keeping in check. "You can't seriously believe you'll get away with this. The Guardians are going to find you eventually, and when they _do_…"

"They'll unleash their full force and leave me weak and powerless yet again," Pitch finished for him, his yellow eyes glowing eerily from beneath the mantle of shadows. "I know how this ends, Frost. It has happened before, and will no doubt happen again."

"Then why keep on doing it?" Jack asked, genuinely bewildered. Even _he_ had known when to quit when it came to trying to get the attention of the Guardians. Pitch, however, did not seem to possess even that much common sense. "You know you can't win."

"Perhaps it is not about me winning," the unexpected answer came. "Perhaps it is simply about insuring your precious Guardians _never_ can. How can you win a war against an enemy that cannot be defeated? You'll be fighting against me for the rest of your lives, and one day…one day you _will_ make a mistake, and you will lose, and these precious children you are so willing to risk life and limb for will finally, _finally_ stop believing."

"We'll _never_ stop believing!" Jamie declared adamantly, and Jack tossed a warm grin the young boy's way, impressed by the bravery on display. "No matter what you do, we won't stop!"

"Brave words, little Jamie Bennett," Pitch addressed him patronizingly. "Tell me, did you enjoy your swim?"

"I'm not afraid of you," Jamie maintained adamantly, refusing to back down. Pitch merely laughed, however, his amber gaze alighting on Jack.

"You _have_ trained your little believer well, haven't you, Frost?"

"This isn't about Jamie," Jack retorted coolly. "Or Sophie. It never has been. That pool was meant for me. It was _my_ memory."

"Ah, how perceptive of you."

There was a sudden rustle of movement, Pitch's dark form disappearing into the darkness of the enormous cavern once more. A moment later he was standing right beside them, and Jack backpedaled, throwing up an ice-wall between himself and the Nightmare King. Pitch shattered it with an amused laugh, but Jack stood his ground, refusing to allow the dark spirit access to the two children.

"You've done _well_, Frost," Pitch praised, watching him closely. "I must say I _am_ impressed, you've gone much further than I thought you would. I was almost certain the frozen pond would at leave give you pause."

It had done more than that. It had dug up memories that had been repressed by more than just the Man in the Moon. Memories he was almost positive he wasn't _meant_ to remember, and certainly hadn't _wanted_ to. But there was no way he was telling Pitch that, or admitting any weakness at all.

"You should know better than to underestimate me," he responded instead, referencing the multiple occasions in the past where Pitch had done so at his own peril.

"Oh, believe me, I haven't underestimated you at all." Pitch's smile was too confident, too _knowing_ for Jack to be at all comfortable. "You haven't won the game yet. You didn't really think escaping would be so easy, did you?"

"I never believed you wouldn't try to cheat," Jack answered smoothly. "If that's what you're asking."

"Is it cheating when I am the one inventing the rules?" Pitch wondered aloud, tilting his head to the side slightly. "Or is it merely enjoying what _you_ once had? Enjoying being the _victor_."

"You said this was game," Jack reminded him, after a quick glance at the two children he was protecting. Jamie was still glaring at Pitch, though he couldn't quite hide the lingering traces of fear brought on by the Nightmare King's presence. "That all I had to do was get them out…"

"No, Jack, I said this was _your_ game," Pitch corrected with a smirk. "One you know so very well. You _invented _it, more than three hundred years ago. The one where you use _fun_ to conquer fear. But for that game to work, Jack, fear must first exist. So, tell me; what do _you_ fear?"

"Not you," Jack's answer was curt and flat. "Not in a million years."

"Oh, I _know_ you don't fear me." Pitch waved away the rebellious statement, his lips still pulled into a sly smile, yellow eyes glowing, piercing the darkness. "But you _do_ fear something." He paused, cocking his head to the side curiously, then asked, "Do you know why I brought you here, Jack?"

"For your own amusement?" he hazarded a guess, and earned himself another dark chuckle for his efforts.

"Amusement?" Pitch repeated smoothly. "Whilst I do not deny it has been entertaining watching you try to escape this place, that is not why you are here. Nor is it why I broke _this_."

The shard was in his hands again, and once more Jack found his gaze unwittingly drawn to the small object, his hand traveling on instinct to rest again his ribcage, where the hollow void the staff's absence left in its wake lingered. The void that had once been the tether that kept his abilities grounded. That stopped him from doing what he was doing even now, as the chamber in which they stood grew steadily colder, the heat Pitch had filled it with giving way beneath the affect he himself had on his surroundings.

"Did you know?" Pitch wondered aloud, watching him closely. Jack could not tear his eyes away from the fragment of his weapon, and only peripherally noted the Nightmare King's movements. "Did you understand your own abilities at all? Or were you as ignorant as the rest of them?"

His eyes flittered back up to meet the dark spirit's gaze, and he scowled, hating how vulnerable his next words made him. "What do you mean?"

Pitch's expression softened, and something akin to sympathy-a twisted, dark sort of sympathy-sounded in his voice as he spoke, "The Man in the Moon really did leave you high and dry, didn't he, Frost? You have _him_ to thank for all your weaknesses, don't you? It was your memories the first time, memories _he_ kept from you, and now it is this. A staff you know is important, but are as clueless as all others when it comes to _why_."

"Stop playing games, Pitch," Jack warned, his frustration building, and with it the tempest he was only barely keeping contained within him. "I'm not in the mood."

"A pity," Pitch murmured. "It would have been better for you if you were." The Nightmare King stepped back then, shrinking into the shadows so that only his eyes remained visible, his cruel words cutting through the air like a scythe. "Take them."

Jack's eyes widened, the only reaction he had time for before the Nightmares were upon him.

* * *

Bunny bounded out of his hole at speed, abruptly slamming on the brakes when he realized he couldn't see a damned thing. He had guessed at the exact location of their quarry from the globe and Baby Tooth's directions, but apparently his guess had been a little off, because they hadn't landed _outside _the cave she spoke of, but _inside _it.

"Where are we?" Tooth whispered uncertainly, and he could feel the brush of wind from her wings as she turned to and fro, trying to pierce the darkness with her gaze. Bunny himself remained still, waiting for his night vision to kick in, and frowning once it did. The passageway was entirely empty, and there was no sign as to which way they should go to further their search.

"Is Pitch's lair," North answered subduedly as Bunny sniffed the air, searching for a familiar scent. Or any scent at all. "Can't you feel it?"

"He brought the children _here_?" Her voice was little more than a whisper, though Bunny did not blame her for that. Echoes in this place were just eerie. "The poor things."

"They have Jack to look after 'em," he reminded her, whirling about to face the opposite direction as he caught the barest whiff of…of _something_. "I'm sure they'll be fine."

"But will _he_ be?" she questioned nervously. "Bunny, I have a really bad feeling about all of this."

Bunny did as well, but he wasn't about to tell her as much outright. "This is Pitch's hideout," he reminded her. "The only thing down here is bad feelings."

Tooth was silent for a while, digesting that, and Bunny was able to focus fully on trying to detect another living being in this black hole that barely even qualified as a hole. Everything was muffled and confused down in the darkness. Sight, sound, and scent, all tainted by the touch of something less than wholesome.

"Do you have anything?" North asked anxiously, and, with a huff of frustration, the Easter Guardian shook his head.

"No," he said tautly. "I got nothing. We could pick a direction at random, but then we could easily end up going the wrong way entirely."

"What do we do then?" Tooth pressed, looking to him for answers he wasn't sure he could provide. "Wait?"

"We may not have a choice." And that grated on him. Inactivity. How he _hated_ it. But the truth was that rushing this, picking a direction at random, before they were _sure_…Well, it could only end badly. This was Pitch's lair. _His_ territory. They needed to act with the utmost caution, even if that meant standing in the middle of a dark corridor and doing _nothing_.

The hum of Tooth's wings was piercing in the silence, and he had no trouble at all detecting when she drew closer.

"I could send some of my fairies," she suggested, sounding helpless. "If they split up…"

"We'd be playing right into Pitch's hands." Tooth could not possibly know how tempting that offer was, but Bunny knew the risks of dividing their numbers, and Pitch had easily entrapped Tooth's fairies before. "No, we wait."

Tooth didn't answer him verbally, resorting to flitting back and forth down the corridor instead. Bunny watched her for a few moments, then tuned his ears and nose back to searching for a sign he had to believe would come.

_Come on, Jack_, he willed silently._ You normally leave a blazing trail a blind bat couldn't miss. Give us something to work with here._

"What if we're already too late?" Tooth stated suddenly, taking him wholly by surprise, though not as much as the answer that did _not_ come from within the Guardians' ranks.

"Oh, you _are_. Too late by far. Considering I left you a guide, it's quite pitiful really."

"_Pitch_." Both boomerangs already in hand, Bunny spun with the rest of his group to stare at the Nightmare King. Pitch was barely even visible in the embodiment of his name, but Bunny did not need to _see_ his smile to know it was _there_. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't drop you where you stand."

"I have none," Pitch said, spreading his hands. "But you aren't going to attack me, rabbit, because,_ if you do_, any chance of finding your precious Jack Frost slips through your fingers."

"Where is he?" Tooth demanded, pushing her way past North to hover alongside Bunny. "What have you _done_ with them?"

"Me?" Pitch laughed. "I don't know, Toothiana, I seem to have forgotten. It must have been that tooth you stole from me. How much do you think knowing where they are is worth, fairy? A quarter?"

Tooth moved as if to strike out at the Nightmare King, but North seized her wrist and held her back.

"Pitch," the Christmas Guardian started. "We do not have to do this…"

"Oh, I think we _do_," Pitch cut him off with malice. "You _had_ to know this was coming, _Santa_. How many times did you think you could get away with pushing me back into the shadows before I'd had enough? How much longer did you think you could _win_? Were it not for Frost, you would have already lost, I am simply leveling the playing field again."

"Jack's done _nothing_ to you!" Tooth protested, her voice thick with emotion. "He doesn't deserve this!"

"Ah, so your little pet doesn't share everything with you after all." Pitch's eyes gleamed with amusement. "Though it _is_ true you have a great deal more to answer for than he does."

"Jack tells us more than you know," Bunny interjected sharply, covering for the gap in the knowledge of his compatriots. He hadn't had time to fill them in on everything, and he hadn't really felt comfortable doing so without Jack's permission. He had pried the story from the winter spirit unwillingly, after all, the least he could do was keep it to himself. "And, if you ask me, you deserved everything you got."

"Perhaps." Pitch was unperturbed. "But does he?"

"What're you trying to say?" He was almost growling now, his grasp on his weapons so tight they were digging into his hands.

"That Jack is going to answer for every one of your mistakes. Every _rejection_. Every time you have _dared_ stand in my path. He is going to pay, and you are going to watch, and _know_ that everything that has happened is _your_ fault." Pitch paused briefly, before all but purring his last words, "I can think of no better punishment."

Surprisingly enough, it was Sandy, and not any of the other three, who snapped first. His sand whips cracking past his comrades and illuminating the shadows in which Pitch had chosen to hide. The Nightmare King dodged swiftly, his smooth laughter echoing in his wake as he simply vanished through the walls, leaving the Guardians alone in the darkness, with nothing but their thoughts to keep them company.

"Bloody hell!" Bunny muttered under his breath, sheathing his weapons and then jumping slightly when Sandy touched his arm. Blaming it immediately on the creepy atmosphere of this place and hoping the darkness had hidden his reaction from the others, he turned to the Guardian of Dreams.

"What is it, Sandy?" he inquired, somewhat grateful for the light the glowing little man provided.

Sandy formed a small cloud of sand in his hands, then turned and released it down the tunnel. Bunny watched it float away, and, as it did, tiny, tear drop shaped icicles running along the bottom of the passageway revealed themselves, glowing briefly and brightly as the glowing sand passed by, before becoming dull and dark again once it was gone.

"Attaboy, Frosty," Bunny murmured, a quick smile flashing across his face.

This was it. This was Jack trusting _them_ to follow him, find him, and _help_ him. Bunny was determined that that faith would _not_ be misplaced, and he did not hesitate to turn to the other three.

"What are we waiting for?" he demanded. "Let's go pay Pitch a visit."

**A/N2: Not sure whether this one counts as a cliffhanger or not, but, even if it does, it's not anywhere near as cruel as the two that are about to follow. -D**


	12. Chapter 11: The Touch of Winter

**THIS CHAPTER IS DARK-YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.  
**

**A/N: So, you guys are actually extremely lucky to get this chapter, because my computer came very close to spontaneously dying yesterday. After a number of crashes, however, and several failed attempts to back-up, it seems to have gotten over its little temper tantrum and is now on it's best behavior. Fingers crossed it won't do the same thing again any time soon.  
**

**Um, this chapter. Yeah, I'm pretty sure you are all going to hate me for this, just...just remember that if you murder the author, you won't get the rest of the story. Now excuse my while I run for my life...  
**

**CHAPTER 11**

**-The Touch of Winter-**

"Jack!" Jamie shouted, watching with wide eyes as his friend was swept away by a sheer _wave_ of Nightmares, a flash of blue the only thing visible in the swarming mass. "Jack!"

Without thought for his own safety he darted forward, intent on helping the Guardian of Fun, but rebounded off an invisible barrier as soon as he drew level with the columns marking the crossover point between the outer circle and the inner. Horrified, he placed both hands against the wall of _nothing_, pushing with all his might to no avail. He _could not get through_.

"Jack!"

He didn't know if sound could travel through whatever was keeping him from reaching his friend, and his attention was distracted from any response that might have been thrown his way when Sophie gave a loud scream. Spinning quickly, Jamie rushed to his sister's side, injecting himself between her and the three Nightmares surrounding the girl. Remembering how he and his friends had cured the majority of Pitch's minions the first time around he stretched out a hand to touch the nearest of the creatures, but, to his horror, these Nightmares didn't dissolve at a touch, and he was almost trampled by the one he attempted to tame. It was little Sophie, tugging frantically on his sleeve, that kept him free of the danger, and he staggered beneath one of the rearing monsters, tumbling head over heels as he lost his balance and slammed into the wall.

Or, what should have _been_ the wall.

Instead, he and Sophie passed right through the barricade, tumbling into the passageway beyond. On his feet in a second, Jamie raced back to the hidden doorway, throwing himself against what was now solid.

"No!" he cried in denial. "Jack!" Stepping back, he kicked out savagely at the unmoving stone. "Let me _through_."

To his astonishment, his foot passed through up to his ankle, causing him to land on his rump as he lost his balance. He was still sitting when the first Nightmare's head came through the wall, and it took a mad scramble to get himself upright and beside his sister.

"Come on, Sophie!" Clutching the frightened girl's hand, Jamie didn't even chance a glance back as he commanded, "_Run_!"

* * *

Having insured that the Guardians were on their way, Pitch turned his focus towards making sure the children could not interfere. They were the reality upon which the illusion was to be based, but, whilst something _real_ could create something not, it could just as easily destroy it. He needed the children gone, and it was incredibly satisfying to watch both the boy and his sister so easily stumble through the trap he prepared for them. Absentmindedly commanding a few of the Nightmares to pursue the pair, just to insure they stayed well out of the way, Pitch switched his attention to Jack, and the true prize in this elaborate game.

With a snap of his fingers, he pulled upon the string he had so painstakingly put in place, and with the quiet, noiseless advance of all Pitch's works, the waking nightmare began.

* * *

Sadly, this wasn't the first time Jack had been wholly overrun by Pitch's Nightmares. Whilst he was honestly surprised that this many of the dark creatures had survived that fateful night, he wasn't as panicked by their seeming determination to crush him underfoot as he should have been, a fact he felt could be largely attributed to this having happened before.

It felt strange, fighting without his staff, without the wind to carry him and never quite sure if his attacks were going to end up where he wanted them to be. But the lack of direction had not at all affected the strength of what he could throw at Pitch's minions, and they fell just as easily before a wild blast as they did a controlled. As he spun, ducked, pivoted, and dodged, Jack realized that the _real_ enemy here was not the Nightmares at all, but rather Pitch, who had vanished when the Nightmares first attacked, and now reappeared, floating over the battlefield like some sort of judge, his laughter sounding insidiously all around the fighting Guardian.

Pitch, whom Jack had once pitied.

Whom he _still_ pitied.

He _hated_ that the feeling was present. That, even as he fought to protect both himself and the two kids Pitch had _kidnapped, _he could _still_ feel remorse for the life the Nightmare King had been forced to lead. He didn't like the way that pity twisted his insides. The way he could see so many reflections of himself in his enemy. The way he wanted to _redeem_ Pitch the way he had been redeemed. It would have been so much easier to _hate_ Pitch, but he couldn't, and for that he hated himself.

Unleashing his frustrations in a punishing barrage of frost bursts and snow flurries mixed with deadly icicles Jack decimated a fair number of the Nightmares snapping and striking at him, landing in front of Jamie and Sophie where they were huddled against one of the pillars with his chest heaving, but satisfaction in his eyes as he watched the rest of Pitch's forces back off slightly, clearly wary of antagonizing him further.

"It's over, Pitch!" he called up at the floating shadow. "We'll be leaving now. _Don't _try to stop us."

Herding the two children before him into the nearest visible corridor Jack turned to leave, but was arrested in his progress when Pitch spoke again, his words layered with venom.

"Why did they make you a Guardian, Frost?" the Nightmare King demanded, his amber eyes bright as he advanced on them, the remaining Nightmares hastening to flank their master. "You don't _protect_ children, you drag them down with you. Who was it, after all, who took your sister to that lake? You didn't _save_ her, you merely removed her from a peril you had placed her in in the first place, and you won't save these two now!"

"Go, Jamie!" Jack commanded, his arms spread to deny the Nightmare King access to the tunnel, though he knew the Boogeyman could just as easily slip around him. "Run!"

To his great relief the boy obeyed without question, bolting down the corridor with Sophie in tow, leaving Jack and Pitch alone.

"Heroic to the very end, hm?" Pitch smirked, openly amused. "You needn't worry about the children, Jack. I won't harm them, but I won't help them either. We are in the middle of nowhere. Where do you really think they are going to go? Exposed to the elements, _alone_, they'll die long before anyone ever finds them."

"The Guardians will find them," Jack retorted calmly. More calmly than he _felt_.

"The Guardians?" Pitch openly laughed. "Your belief in _them_ is childish, to say the least. Where does that faith come from, Jack? What have _they_ done to prove themselves to _you_? You weren't the one who went looking to them for help, it was _they_ who needed _you_. They who left you to find all the answers on your own. Little Jack Frost flying to the rescue. But what are they going to do without you, Jack? You think they care for a couple of mere children? Nay, they can't see the individuals for the crowd. But you know that, don't you?"

Pitch was closing in now, step by towering step, but Jack refused to move, holding his ground and glaring up at the spectre the Nightmare King painted.

"You are intimately acquainted with their indifference to a singular entity. You know what it is like to die alone, unloved. You've been dying a little bit each day for three hundred years. The slow, agonizing death of a child's belief that the world somehow _cares _about them. But _nobody_ cared about you, Jack, and nobody will care about the two children you just sentenced to death! Know that that is how young Jamie Bennett and his dear, _dear_ sister will die. Alone. _Believing_ till their last breath that the Guardians will save them when nothing could be further from the truth, and it will be _your_ fault!"

The Boogeyman was looming over the young Guardian now, and Jack couldn't help but cower beneath the Nightmare King's shadow, his heart thundering wildly in his chest despite his best efforts to still it and the insidious, silky words working their way inside his mind. He knew Pitch, and he knew what it was the other spirit was trying to do, but that didn't stop the words from ringing in his ears, or the fear for Jamie and Sophie from springing to life and driving his heart to an even more frantic pace. Pitch was smiling down at him triumphantly, clearly absolutely certain that he had won, and that _scared_ Jack, because he had sent Jamie _away_, and if Pitch was that certain…

"You think you are something special now, don't you, Jack?" Pitch sneered bitterly, interrupting his rapidly spiraling thoughts. "The lonely frost child plucked from his wretched life to bask in the glory of being a Guardian. You've forgotten your miserable roots, and think yourself free to hate those you once numbered amongst."

And, just like that, the spell was broken. Clarity dawned on him like the fresh relief of a winter flurry, and he straightened, confident even beneath the intimidating stare of his adversary.

"I don't hate you," he said, softly and truthfully, because he _didn't_. He _didn't _hate Pitch. Not like the other Guardians did. He knew what the Nightmare King had done was wrong, and he was _angry _with the dark spirit for taking Jamie and Sophie. There was no excusing the fact he had tried to harm children, but what Pitch had done…it hadn't been enough to make Jack _hate_ him. Not by a long shot. "I _pity_ you."

"Save your pity, you sanctimonious fool!" Pitch snarled viciously, and Jack backpedalled slightly, fully expecting a blow. "You have no room for it! You say you do not hate me, but that hatred will come soon enough."

Hesitant to ask, Jack spoke regardless. "What are you talking about?"

Pitch smiled, his voice level again as he said, "I never looked at your memories, Jack."

The statement paralyzed him, and he stood, uncomprehending, sounds falling from his lips without his say-so. "Then how…How did you _know_?"

Something dark and _evil _flashed in the Nightmare King's eyes, and when he answered it was nothing like Jack had expected.

"Do you want to know why the ice broke that day, Jack?" the dark spirit asked softly. "Do you want to know why it betrayed you? It was _me_. It was _my_ doing. You were never a believer in the Boogeyman, always so sickeningly cheerful and playful. I was going to take her away from you, then watch you stew in guilt and misery, but seeing you die was just as rewarding. Until the Man in the Moon had the bright idea of bringing you back!"

The words took him wholly by surprise, and he staggered back slightly. "You were _there_?"

"Of _course_ I was there!" Pitch laughed. "Did you not feel my presence? The darkness swallowing you whole?"

Jack froze.

_It was cold_, he had thought. _It was dark. And I was _scared.

"Ah," Pitch smiled, seeing the look on his face. "You _do_ remember then."

Jack opened his mouth to respond, but found the words unwilling to come. Finally, weakly, with disbelief clouding every sound, he said, "You...you _killed_ me?"

"I did." It felt like someone had punched him in the stomach, effortlessly removing all air from his lungs. Jack could only stare at Pitch, at the triumphant smirk he couldn't really see because he was remembering his dream on that snowy hillside and the yellow eyes that had watched him drown.

"But your _sister_, Jack!" the Nightmare King chuckled, and Jack felt something inside of him begin to boil at the sheer _glee _in Pitch's voice. "She lived with such delicious _fear_ for the rest of her childhood, because _you_ weren't there to stop it from happening! You do not know what pleasure I took in giving her a life where everything, _everything_ was Pitch Black and there wasn't a _glimpse_ of Jack Frost in sight."

His anger was an unwholesome thing, hot and red and burning inside of him. Unconsciously, he took a step forward, his hands fisted tightly at his sides.

"Where were you, Jack?" the dark spirit taunted. "Where were you when she was crying and alone and terrified of the monsters in the shadows? Oh, that's right. You didn't even _remember_ her, your _own_ sister, and you _still_ don't even know her _name_. What sort of a Guardian are you, Jack Frost, that you couldn't even protect your own sister? What kind of a _brother_?"

"Monster!" The word tore itself free of his lips in a scream as he leapt forward, power surging both through and around him as he hurled all manner of attacks at the Nightmare King. Pitch's laughter echoed all around him, the dark spirit just as impossibly elusive as the source of the sound, vanishing and reappearing almost too swiftly to trace. "Stand, you coward!"

Pitch was suddenly before him, an elated expression on his face. "_Make_ me!"

Jack cast everything he had at the dark spirit's smirking visage, but Pitch merely vanished into the floor, leaving the wall of ice and snow to crash into the opposite side of the room. Several thick chunks of stone tore free of the ceiling and crashed to the floor below, their impact shaking the earth beneath Jack's feet, but the winter spirit ignored it, already racing forward across the frozen surface towards Pitch, an icicle replica of his shattered staff in his hands. He waved the item as he drew near, swinging it about as he would have the genuine article, letting loose the boundless power caged inside of him.

This was not the same as the blast of energy he had released at the wave of Nightmares that fateful night when he last stopped Pitch in his tracks. This was something else. Something far wilder, that tore its way free of his body and exploded outwards without direction. The Nightmares unfortunate enough to find themselves between him and their master gave way beneath the vehement, cold hurricane that ripped between and through them, ice shards and snow scattering in all directions to coat the walls, floor, and even the ceiling in a colorful display of snow and frosted ice that formed intricate patterns wherever it touched a solid surface.

Jack stood still in the midst of all this, gasping for breath slightly as he gazed in shock upon the damage he himself had caused.

"Bravo, Jack!" Pitch applauded, standing, unharmed, in the midst of the carnage. "But I think you might have frozen your little friends."

_What_?

His makeshift staff clattered to the ground as he whirled, staring at the yawning chasm of the tunnel, and feeling the blood in his veins turn to ice.

Jack Frost had never known warmth. Cold had been his constant companion, his friend ever since he was reborn. He did not understand what it was to _be_ warm, even though he felt heat, but he understood the chill of winter. _Lived_ the chill of winter. Or so he had thought, until Pitch's accusation left him standing, frozen to his very core, staring at the opening to the tunnel he had sent the kids down.

He knew the dangers of winter. He had seen people die far too often to not know the peril that accompanied the season he represented. He had done what he could in his three hundred years to redirect storms away from the vulnerable, to try and allow warmth to linger a little longer around those prone to sickness, but he was but a spirit of winter, and he did not command the season itself. He wielded only a part of it, a miniature replica of a far greater whole, and the season of cold, dark, and sickness paraded on without him. He had watched lives, young and old, be snuffed out by his greater counterpart, but he had never, _never _hurt anyone who was not a spirit with his powers. No matter _how_ upset he was, Jack Frost had sworn he would never be as cruel as Winter.

That oath had just shattered into a million fragmented pieces.

_I told Jamie to go…_

Pitch forgotten, he moved slowly forward, almost in a trance, unable to tear his eyes away.

_I _told _him to run…_

There were two forms huddled beneath the curve of the arch. Two still, small, _innocent _forms.

_No. Please no. Please, _please_ no._

He crashed to his knees beside them, hands reaching to touch pale skin, his eyes seeing the blue tinge to the lips, the wide, staring eyes.

_This can't be happening…_

"Jamie." His voice was broken and raw, his hands trembling so badly he could barely grasp the boy's cold arm as he shook it gently. "_Jamie_."

_I didn't…couldn't have…no…nonononono._

"Such a shame to see young lives wasted," Pitch purred, lingering behind him. "Lost in the presence of a Guardian, no less."

Jack was on his feet in an instant, whirling, uncaring that there were tears in his eyes and spilling down his cheeks.

"You _did_ this!" he shouted the accusation furiously, snow and ice whirling about him in response to a rage such as he had never felt before. Years of loneliness, of _rejection_, had nothing on the maelstrom brewing inside of him now, waiting for but the right trigger to release it.

"No, Jack." Pitch smiled. "_You_ did this."

And, lost in the depths of a darkness far deeper than that of Pitch's lair, Jack screamed.


	13. Chapter 12: Blizzard

**A/N: Here we go then, guys. Our titular chapter. I think this is probably my favorite chapter in the story so far, but before you read on I have a couple of announcements to make.  
**

**The first announcement is that there will be no update this Sunday. My older brother is getting married and I am one of the bridesmaids, so I'm not even going to be home.  
**

**Second, is that I am most likely going to take this story back to once a week updates to give me a bit more time to write further chapters in between. I do have another five chapters written after this one, but for the amount of proofreading and rewriting I do I'd prefer to have a little more time. Hopefully this doesn't upset anyone too much. Updates will be on Tuesdays/Wednesdays from here on in. :-)  
**

**Thirdly, there are going to be a number of MAJOR bookspoilers in this story not too far along from this chapter. When I first started writing this fic I hadn't read the books, but I made the fatal mistake of doing so before I was done and now I find myself putting the existing book-canon in and trying to reconcile it to move-canon. In terms of adherence to the book content, however, I will be taking liberties, so if you're a stickler for canon you might want to bow out now.  
**

**And finally, to quote HTTYD, 'you are amazing!' This story jumped from 186 reviews to 246 over just two chapters, and it's all thanks to you lovely people. Give yourselves an applause. :-)  
**

**Read, review, and enjoy.  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 12**

**-Blizzard-**

Jamie staggered as the ground beneath him shook suddenly, Sophie falling flat at his side with a wail as the rumbling continued, the walls trembling even as he groped at them for balance. A cold wind, harsh and piercing, rippled down the corridor and pulled at his clothes, making him shiver almost as bad as he had after his impromptu dip. The Nightmares hesitated in the face of this strange phenomenon, and Jamie, knowing it could only have one source, whirled in horror, trying to peer through the darkness.

"Jack!" There was no response to his call, unless one counted the swiftly strengthening wind. Jamie lost his hold on the wall and collapsed beside his sister, carefully wrapping one arm about her as the Nightmares whinnied restlessly, fighting to keep their feet. They could not withstand the gusts of wind whistling through the tunnel, however, and it was not long before they dissolved entirely, the sand they formed stinging Jamie's hands and face as it whipped past. "Jack!"

"Jamie! Sophie!"

The answer didn't come from the direction he had been expecting, and the young boy turned in surprise, Sophie letting out an excited squeal as a familiar, tall form hopped into view.

"Bunny, Bunny!"

"Hey there, little one." The Easter Guardian crouched down beside them, shielding them somewhat from the roaring gale tearing its way down the hall. "You okay?"

"We're both okay," Jamie hastened to assure the rabbit. "But you've got to help Jack! Pitch…"

"What we've _got_ to do is get the two of you out of here," Bunny said, glancing up at the hum of wings as Tooth joined them, struggling to stay afloat in the strong air flows. "I guess North and Sandy went the wrong way."

"It was a fifty-fifty chance when the trail disappeared," Tooth responded, hovering lower to check on the children. "You two had us worried."

Jamie, impatient with both of them, responded with demands.

"Jack _needs_ your help," he asserted, waving a hand down the tunnel. "You're his friends, right? You _have_ to go to him."

The two Guardians exchanged a glance, and Jamie held his breath, hoping they were not like other adults he knew who simply overrode the judgment of a child. To his relief, when Bunny reached down to haul him and Sophie to his feet the Easter Guardian handed them both over to the Tooth Fairy, but did not move himself.

"You get the kids out of here, Tooth," Bunny ordered. "I'll get Jack."

"I want to come with you!" Tooth protested, taking the children's hands into her own nonetheless.

"You can't fly in this," Bunny gestured vaguely, indicating the wind he was blocking from all three of them, and standing stooped as a result of. "But you can get these two out of danger." When the female Guardian still hesitated, Bunny added pointedly, "I want to be able to tell Jack they're safe, Tooth."

"Okay." Reluctantly, or so it seemed, the Guardian of Memories conceded, turning to the two now in her charge as she offered them what looked to be a forced smile. "Let's go, you two."

Jamie allowed himself to be led away, but he couldn't resist a glance back over his shoulder. A glance that allowed him to see the moment when the Easter Guardian's ears drooped, and the worry that shone clearly in his eyes as he turned and hastened down the corridor.

* * *

There had been an occasion once, a long time ago, when one of Bunny's warrior eggs had stumbled into a coloring pond. The Easter Guardian had spent the better half of his day trying to push the damn thing out, regretting the fact it weighed a ton and that he daren't ask any of the others for help because he _knew_ how long ammunition like that would last. He _had_ eventually gotten the wretched egg out, but he could still clearly remember how much exertion it had taken.

It was taking him nearly the same just to _walk_ right now.

Staggering forward, he crawled his way along, clinging to the wall for dear life. He had no idea what was going on at the end of the tunnel, but he was certain it couldn't be good. Step by step, hand over hand, he slowly neared the archway marking the end of the passage, strips of a strange, dark, clinging material flapping on either side like a torn curtain. Using the spider-web like substance for leverage he stumbled into the room beyond with a sense of triumph and relief that dissolved so swiftly he barely felt it at all.

There was a sourceless wind winding around and around the circular chamber he now found himself in with enough force as to almost rip the Easter Guardian off his feet as soon as he stepped into it, the gale carrying with it a thousand dangers. Snow swirled all about, caught in the current and twirling between the large ice shards and other projectiles caught up in the middle of the whirlwind. Bunny could barely see through the violent blizzard, and what he did see offered no comfort at all.

Jack was floating in the very middle of the vortex, suspended on nothing at all, arms outstretched to the side and head thrown back in a twisted mimic of elation. The winter Guardian's eyes, always a piercing blue, were glowing, the same ethereal luminescence framing his entire body as he stared unseeingly up through the eye of the storm. He looked frighteningly akin to a puppet hanging limply upon its strings, and Bunny knew exactly who was on the other end.

"Jack!" he shouted, with no real hope of being heard over the screaming wind he had to fight against for every step he took into the chamber. To his left, one of the columns supporting the ceiling gave way, crumbling to the floor and shattering into black dust. Bunny ignored it, raising his paws to protect his face from the sharp ice shards whipping through the air as he continued attempting to gain the attention of the out-of-control spirit. "Jack, _stop this_!"

"It's too late." Bunny froze, turning disbelievingly to stare at the shadowy figure that now stood beside him. For a moment it was as if the world around him had stilled, like _he _was now the one standing in the eye of the storm, but then he realized that Pitch was blocking as much of the storm as possible with his sand. The Nightmare King was not even looking at him as he spoke, his eyes focused on Jack, and the most twisted expression of horror, joy, regret, and triumph painted across his face. "The damage is already done."

"_You did this_!" Bunny roared, seizing the dark spirit by his collar and shaking him, barely even noticing the fact Pitch had not dematerialized as soon as he made a move towards the dark being. "What did you _do_?"

"I merely showed him what he truly is," Pitch replied callously. Except it _wasn't_ callous, for there was something else in the Boogeyman's voice. Something named yet unnamable. Something Bunny couldn't recognize. "A creature of death."

"Jack is _nothing_ of the sort!" Furious, Bunny had pulled a fist back before he was even aware of it, not letting the limb fly, but rather holding it there as a warning. "I don't know what you did to mess with his head, but you're going to stop it. Stop it _now_!"

"I can't," Pitch answered flatly, meeting Bunny stare for stare. "When you destroy a dam there is no putting the stones back together again until the flood is over. This is out of my control now. I cannot stop it."

A portion of the ceiling fell behind them both, disintegrating with a thundering crash, and Bunny released Pitch suddenly as slow realization sunk in. This was Pitch's lair, after all. His haven. And Jack was _destroying_ it. Nightmares dissolved all around them, swallowed up by the black hole that was the winter spirit's blizzard, and Bunny was somewhat stricken to realize the only thing saving him from a similar fate was Pitch's own sand.

"And neither can you." Suddenly breaking free of whatever strange trance had gripped him, Pitch smiled. "I would suggest making a quick exit, rabbit, before you _die_ down here."

With those parting words, Pitch vanished, and Bunny stumbled, fighting to keep his footing as the winds crashed over him once more. He cursed loudly as a large shard of ice ripped through his arm, but didn't stop, pressing his way through the storm.

"_Jack_!" Something struck him, _hard_, and he reeled and fell, smacking against cold stone with an uncomfortable amount of force. Determined beyond dissuasion, Bunny began to crawl, edging his way forwards, inch by perilous inch. "Jack! _Snap out of it_!"

He wasn't making any headway at all, and he wasn't sure if his words were _reaching_ Jack at all let alone getting through to the teenage immortal. Gritting his teeth against the biting cold and stinging blows of the airborne winter creations, Bunny heaved himself back up into a standing position, gauging distances and _exactly_ where he needed to be before tapping his foot and letting himself freefall down the hole that formed as a result of the movement. A second later he was flying upwards, wrapping his arms about Jack's rigid form and sending them both crashing to the frozen floor below.

Jack cried out as they made impact, fighting like a wild thing even though he was half crushed by the Easter Guardian's bulk, and Bunny let out a yelp of his own as he felt ice forming across his chest and spreading outwards at an alarming rate.

"Jack!" Acting on instinct, he grasped Jack by the shoulders and shook him as roughly as his rapidly stiffening limbs would allow, before grasping the younger Guardian's face and forcing luminescent blue eyes to meet his own. "_Frost_, it's me. It's Bunny. You need to _stop_!"

Abruptly, without the slightest bit of warning, everything around them came to a standstill. The wind, roaring and raging a bare second before, stilled, and everything it had carried in its arms fell. Bunny flinched as a good deal of snow and at least two icicles struck him on their descent, but did not turn away from the suddenly terrified, no longer gleaming gaze of his friend. The devastated look that lingered beneath that terror frightened Bunny, but he forced himself to wait, to not ask the question on his mind. He didn't want to risk setting Jack off again, and he had no idea what Pitch had done to begin what had very nearly killed him.

He had underestimated Frost.

They all had.

But not again.

Doing his best not to notice the ice still crackling on his chest and the wild frost patterns forming, dissipating, and the reforming around them, Bunny moved his hands to rest on Jack's shoulders again, sitting still and silent in the midst of snow, shattered ice, and cracked stone like the survivor of a violent battle still wondering whether or not the fight had been won. At length, however, his patience was rewarded when Jack finally spoke.

"What are you doing here?"

When Bunny had found Jack on that hillside in the South Pole the winter spirit had been wounded, confused, and exhibiting signs of shock. He had asked Bunny the reason for his presence, but it had been a reflex, the staggered, stuttered workings of a mind not wholly comprehending its surroundings. Those same words thrown at him now were something different, the tone alone informing the Easter Guardian quite clearly that Jack thought he should be anywhere but where he was.

"Rescuing you, Frosty," he quipped, forcing a smile onto his face even though it felt stretched and forced and _wrong_. "What else? You're making this a habit for me, you know."

"But…I don't…" Confusion added itself to the terror and devastation already lurking in those bright eyes. It was not an improvement. "Why would you come?"

Feeling a hint of impatience, stirred to life by worry, Bunny retorted, "Why _wouldn't_ we come?"

Jack grew so rigid beneath his hold that Bunny was half certain he was holding an icicle, and not the living, moving, breathing spirit of winter. Fear joined the emotions openly on display on the young Guardian's face, and his next words were choked out, smothered by grief so strong it was almost tangible. "Because I…I _killed_…"

"Whoa!" Bunny cut him off instantly, even as everything began to fall into place and suddenly make _sense_. _I'm going to _murder_ Pitch. I'm going to find him, beat him, and then rip him to shreds. _"What the bloody hell are you talking about? You didn't kill anyone, Jack."

"But…Jamie and Sophie…"

"Are both safe and sound with Tooth," Bunny finished confidently, knowing his words to be true.

"Safe?" Jack gasped the word, trembling now with enough force Bunny was afraid he might fall apart. With an effort the winter spirit pushed himself up into a sitting position, staring at Bunny with enough intensity as to make the Easter Guardian uncomfortable. "They're not…I didn't…it wasn't…But I _saw_ them!" he protested at last, all those emotions having merged into hysteria, an unwelcome wildness creeping into his expression. "They were…they were…"

"I don't care what Pitch showed you, Jack," Bunny cut him off forcefully, giving the small Guardian a sharp shake. "I don't _care_ what he made you believe. But I want you to look at me now-_look at me_, Jack,-and _listen_ to what I say. You did _not_ hurt those kids. You _protected_ them. You got them out of Pitch's lair safe and sound, which I'm damned sure wasn't easy. Jamie and Sophie are _safe _because of _you_."

"You're sure?" The words were an uncertain whisper, but the hope, the desperate, _needed_ hope that shone now out of the blue depths before him was so clearly present, and so obviously fragile. "I didn't…?"

"No," Bunny reaffirmed, more gently this time. "Whatever you saw wasn't real. They're alive. Safe. Probably on their way home right now."

"Alive…" Jack repeated the word reverently, staring at the floor between them.

Bunny, unsure what to do next, gently squeezed the youngest Guardian's shoulders before withdrawing his hands. Jack wrapped his arms about his own torso, still staring at the floor, shoulders jerking intermittently, though it was not until his sharp ears caught the muffled sound of choked gasps that Bunny realized the teenage immortal was crying. Uncertainly, wishing he had brought Tooth with him after all, he reached out again and tentatively rested a hand on Jack's shoulder.

"Hey…" he began, trailing off as he realized he had no idea what to say. He wasn't _good _at comforting people, but he _did _knowhow it worked, at least, and he had often heard that a physical gesture was far more meaningful than empty words.

"Aw, hell, I've gone soft…"

The words were muttered to himself, but the realization did not stop him from applying enough pressure to tip Jack forward into his chest, both arms going about the smaller Guardian's diminutive frame as he instinctively rubbed gentle circles on the teenage immortal's back.

"Easy mate," he murmured quietly as the youngest Guardian sobbed into his chest, trying not to stiffen when Jack's arms wound their way about his own torso and clutched a hold of him as though he were the last lifeline of a drowning man. "You're okay, Frosty, you're okay. It's over."

If Tooth or North or even Sandy caught wind of this he would never hear the end of it. Right in that moment he didn't particularly care, however, because Pitch had come perilously close to achieving his goal of destroying a Guardian, and he had done so by preying on their youngest member. The one among them most vulnerable to his illusions and deceit. The one with the most insecurities and uncertainty to exploit. The one who deserved this the least. If losing a little pride was what he had to go through to piece the shattered pieces of his friend-and, dammit all, but Jack _was_ a friend no matter how annoying-back together, then so be it.

When Jack finally did pull away from him, scrubbing furiously at his eyes and allowing Bunny to brush off the melting ice and snow still clinging to the Easter Guardian's fur, it was his own choice, and Bunny let him go willingly, still wary of evoking a negative reaction.

"I'm sorry."

Anyone else might have missed the whispered apology, but Bunny's hearing was unparalleled.

"Nothing to be sorry for," he responded brusquely. "Trust me, mate, you're not the first person to have bawled all over me. You should see North when he's had a tad too much eggnog."

Jack huffed a weak laugh at that, the sound jagged and raw, wiping away the last traces of tears as he lifted his head to meet Bunny's smirk with an almost invisible grin of his own. Upon seeing the winter spirit's face clearly for the first time since he had set foot in the room, it was all Bunny could do to keep his own smile from turning into a grimace. Jack looked horrible, his red rimmed eyes accentuating the paleness of his face, and the trepidation in his expression _painful_ to see in one normally so openly confident. That uncertainty only grew when Jack finally became aware of their surroundings, his eyes widening in alarm, and his mouth falling open long before he was ready to form any words.

When the words _did_ come, they were layered thick with fear. "Bunny…What did I _do_?"

Concerned, the Easter Guardian shot his younger comrade a sharp glance. "You don't remember?"

"I remember fighting Pitch," Jack said slowly, nervously, his hands twisting the fabric of his hoodie. Bunny experienced a strong urge to reach out and still the anxious gesture, but forced himself to remain still and not ruin his image any more than he already had. "And the Nightmares. I remember missing him and hitting…"

"That didn't happen, Jack," Bunny asserted sternly, drawing the winter spirit back from the dark place his mind had wandered. "What else do you remember?"

"Nothing," was the disconcerting reply, and Bunny could see panic mounting in his companion's face. "I don't remember anything after that. What happened? Where's Pitch?" Bunny opened his mouth to respond, but before he could Jack had started to his feet, horror creeping into his face again as he blurted, "Did I do that?"

Confused at first, the Easter Guardian followed Jack's line of sight to the trail of blood streaking the grey fur of his arm. The cut caused in the tempest earlier was still bleeding sluggishly, and it was that deep gash that had caught the young Guardian's attention.

"You weren't yourself, mate," Bunny tried for soothing as he carefully gained his own feet, freezing in place when Jack backed away from him, shaking his head vehemently. The bizarre frost patterns of before were forming about the Guardian of Fun's feet once more, and Bunny eyed the ice and snow crowding the floor distrustfully. A cold breeze started to blow through the decimated chamber, though the cause seemed wholly oblivious to what he was doing. "And, Jack? You need to calm own."

Wild blue eyes met his own in confusion, so he explained.

"There's something wonky going on with your powers, mate."

Bunny couldn't name the expression that crossed over Jack's face then. A mix between relief, trepidation, resignation, and concern, all mangled with something else he could not name. He was distracted momentarily from trying to judge the youngest Guardian's feelings, however, by the cloud of dark sand forming behind Jack. Leaping forward without hesitation he hauled the teenage immortal out of the way, shoving the Guardian of Fun to safety behind him as he tore a boomerang free of its strappings and had it ready to toss before Pitch had even fully formed.

"You stay the bloody hell _away_ from him." He did not care that he had practically _snarled _the words, or that Jack was staring at him in wide-eyed shock, because right about now he was ready to tear Pitch apart piece by tiny little piece, and there was very little holding him back.

"Jack!" Bunny turned his head slightly upon hearing North's voice, feeling relieved upon seeing the big Russian and Sandy emerge from another of the tunnels, and slightly amused by the way Jack almost jumped out of his skin when he was lifted off his feet and enclosed in a bone-crushing embrace. North squeezed him tightly for only a second, before lowering the winter spirit and pushing him to arm's length, his face broken by a wide smile of relief. "Thank goodness you alright!"

"_Alright_?" Pitch's laughter filled the cavern, bouncing off the walls and reverberating all around them. As Sandy shifted to flank Bunny North turned away from Jack to glare at the Nightmare King, but didn't remove his hands from the winter spirit's shoulders. Bunny, for his part, had never _stopped _glaring "You're precious new Guardian is _dying_, or hadn't you noticed?"

"_What_?" Bunnymund exclaimed, whirling to stare at the individual in question.

"Jack?" North said in nearly the same instant, his head whipping about. "What does he mean?"

"Are you hurt, mate?" Bunny added, not bothering to mask his concern, and knowing that visual signs counted for nothing where Jack was concerned.

"No!" the teenage immortal insisted, shaking his head. "No, I'm _fine_."

"Come now, Jack," Pitch tsked scoldingly. "Don't be dishonest. We all know you've been doing something you really shouldn't."

"You'd better explain yourself right now," Bunny ordered, holding his boomerang aloft, ready to throw at a moment's notice. "Or I'll knock out more than just your tooth!"

"Really, rabbit, there is no need for such poor manners." Pitch was wholly unconcerned, and it occurred to Bunny suddenly that the Nightmare King had nothing left to lose. Pitch wouldn't back down, and he wouldn't give up. He had already lost everything, and this right here? Right now? This _revenge_? It was all he had left. Pitch wasn't trying to find his place in the world anymore. He wasn't trying to be noticed. He just wanted them to _pay _for what they had done. "It is hardly my fault you are all so dense."

"I'm warning you, Pitch…" Bunny growled, pushing his realization aside for the time being. An enemy with nothing to lose was dangerous, but they'd dealt with Pitch before and they'd do it again. Right now he just wanted to know what the madman was babbling about.

"Oh, very well." Sighing dramatically, the Nightmare King smiled. "Think about your magic, then, you dense buck. You bring hope. North brings wonder. Sandy brings dreams. And dear Toothiana collects _memories_. Now, what of Jack Frost? He controls the weather, has a season all of his very own. Granted it doesn't come_ from_ him, but he can conjure up ice and snow with a flick of his hand, and you think _all_ that power wrapped up in such a small bundle isn't dangerous at all? That staff is for his own safety, for _your_ safety, so he doesn't kill himself or you when he uses those abilities you all put to such good use when you made him into your little weapon against _me_. But that staff is gone, I made _sure_ of it, and now all that power is building up inside with no safe way to release it."

Taking a step back, Pitch spread his arms at the devastation around him, the smirk on his face one of triumph. The look of a man who knew he had won.

"It's going to kill him," the dark spirit concluded. "Or it's going to kill you, and there's absolutely _nothing_ you can do to stop it."


	14. Chapter 13: Fire

**A/N: Okay, so just a quick author's note today as I am posting this on the fly before me and my siblings go see The Hobbit. I would just like to thank all my readers for their understanding my need for a slower update schedule. You've all been very patient and very nice and I do appreciate that, so thank you.**

**Also, thirteen is not a lucky chapter for Jack. **

**Read, review, and enjoy.**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 13**

**-Fire-**

North was not used to feeling helpless. He was a Guardian, after all, and a fairly impressive one at that, with an army of Yetis and elves at his bidding and a sleigh and snowglobes to take him wherever he needed to be. He was a warrior, an accomplished swordsman and wizard with all manner of discoveries and creations to his name. Even with his strength so intricately tied to the children who believed in him he had never before been rendered helpless. Weak, yes, but not _helpless_.

Facing Pitch now over a thick layer of snow and shattered ice miles beneath the earth's surface, however, he could not help but feel out of his depth. He would be damned if he showed the slightest hint of weakness before Pitch, though, and, with that resolve in mind, he gave the trembling, bony shoulders beneath his grasp a gentle, reassuring squeeze. As Sandy and Bunny both moved forward to place themselves as a barrier between Jack and the Nightmare King, North himself shifted to stand behind the winter spirit, unwilling to leave the youngest Guardian even the least bit vulnerable.

They had lost one of their own before, none of them wanted to repeat the experience.

The four of them stood together, facing Pitch without uttering a word, three of them absorbing the implications of the triumphant words the Nightmare King had just thrown at them, and the fourth…Well, judging by the manner in which Jack was shaking like a leaf beneath his grasp, North suspected the winter spirit was focused on simply remaining upright.

"What?" Pitch said at last, breaking the silence, the white gleam of his teeth standing out against the shadows and the laughter in his voice meant to taunt. "Do not tell me you have all lost your tongues! Where are the threats? The questions? The demands? Come, come, we all know how this game is played."

All three simply glared at him in stony silence, unwilling to play into Pitch's hands, yet knowing that it was the Nightmare King who currently held the advantage over them. Pitch possessed knowledge they did not, though where and how he had come by it remained a mystery. It struck North then as utterly important to discover from whence the information had come, and he was already opening his mouth to interrogate their adversary when Bunny spoke first.

"How did you know?" the Easter Guardian said, verbalizing North's thoughts in a demanding question. "How did you know about _any _of this when _we_ didn't know?"

"Because the Man in the Moon is, quite honestly, a right royal git," Pitch declared flippantly. "He brought a child, a mere _boy_, back from the dead, granted him unfathomable power, tore away his memories, left him alone in the world for three hundred _years_, casually used him as a weapon when it suited him, and neglected to teach that child even the most basic of things about the gift said boy possessed." Pitch's smile darkened. "And you say _he_ is the good guy in all of this? If you ask me, dear old Manny is the worst type of villain there is. But, then, it's not my place to judge, is it, Jack? And well…" Pitch turned his amber gaze almost accusingly onto the other Guardians. "Clearly you are more forgiving than I."

North resisted the urge to shift uneasily beneath the onslaught of the Nightmare King's words, too many of them true. None of the Guardians fully understood why the Man in the Moon had left Jack so isolated from the world. It seemed cruel, and no reason had ever been supplied. They had nothing to justify his actions save for their unmoving faith in his judgment, and even less to justify their own. Jack had never asked them to explain why they had ignored him for so long, and North had a strong suspicion that was more due to the winter spirit being wary of the nature of the answer he might receive rather than any lack of a desire to know. He refused to push, however, content to let Jack come to them in his own time.

Unfortunately, Pitch had no such restraint.

"You didn't answer my question," Bunny interjected harshly, the Easter Guardian clearly affected by the barely veiled accusation despite the fact Jack was apparently ignoring the majority of Pitch's words. Or _absorbing _them, because North was fairly certain a great deal of what the Guardians had once thought was ignored was actually internalized. "How did _you_ know?"

"Research, naturally," Pitch answered smoothly. "It is just as well the seasons do not actually _depend _upon their spirits to bring them about. We would have long since been trapped in an internal winter were that the case." Waving a hand in a somewhat dismissive gesture, Pitch smiled at Jack as he continued, "Of course, none of the other seasons are quite as deadly as winter. The other seasonal spirits do not quite have your flair for destruction, Jack."

"Now wait, _hold_ up," Bunnymund interrupted before the Nightmare King could go any further, his tone incredulous. "Are you saying that you've been _kidnapping_ seasonal spirits just so you could figure out how they worked?"

"Naturally," was the calm response. "It is not as though anyone noticed their absence." Nodding at Jack, he added, "A few months ago, no one would have noticed yours."

Jack, again, did not react to Pitch's venomous words, even as North tightened his grip on the winter spirit and addressed his own question at the Nightmare King, "What did you _do_ to them?"

"I let them go," Pitch stated with a shrug. "Once their purpose was served they were of no further use to me. I even went so far as to return their respective items. In time they will no doubt recover, but I believe I left a lasting impression."

"I don't believe this," Bunny muttered, shaking his head, and Sandy nodded in agreement, his wide face framing a deep frown.

"What's not to believe?" Pitch wondered aloud. "You Guardians have made it quite obvious that anyone _not_ bearing the title is beneath your notice, how was I not to take advantage of such willful ignorance?"

"Enough," North cut in sharply, slicing through the discussion. Pitch was enjoying this far too much, and North had never had an abundance of patience when it came to lengthy discussions about the dark spirit's equally black deeds. "You have made point. What is it you want?"

Pitch cocked his head to the side, a curious gleam in his eyes. "Want?" he repeated musingly. "I don't _want_ anything, North. You have made it blatantly clear that you will stand in the way of any desire I possess, and, though it pains me to admit it, whilst _you_ stand _my_ forces inevitably fall. So, what is the obvious solution?"

"This isn't the first time you've tried to be done with us, mate," Bunny reminded the dark spirit pointedly. "It's never worked out well for you before. It's not going to work now."

"I wouldn't be so sure, rabbit," Pitch chuckled in reply. "In the end it will not be your believers who fail you, but your own arrogance and ignorance that spell your doom. And, when your end comes, I _will_ be there to see it."

"Yeah, yeah, keep talking." Bunny dismissed Pitch's words with an offhand wave. "You realize we've heard all this before?"

"And you will hear it again until it becomes truth," answered the Nightmare King flatly. "But we have strayed from the topic at hand. Or do you care so little for your new addition that you have forgotten his plight already? There's still time to fix all this, you know, and it all revolves around _this_."

Pitch took a step back as he smiled, lifting his arm to hold an item aloft for them to see. Bunny shifted slightly, squinting, but it was North who first recognized what was clutched between the Nightmare King's fingers.

"Give shard back," he commanded authoritatively, meeting Pitch eye to eye. "_Now_."

"And why would I do that?" Pitch asked him, amused. "Why would I give you that power? Why would I _help_ you, when I can do _this_."

Lifting his other hand, Pitch cupped it beneath the dangling shard, muttering words beneath his breath, and North felt his stomach drop when a small tongue of fire sprang to life in the dark spirit's open hand. With a bright, blue flame the blaze wavered back and forth, coming just short of setting the staff fragment ablaze.

"How…?" Bunny spluttered, staring in disbelief at the conjured fire, but North already had a suspicion as to just how the Nightmare King had learnt such a trick, and, as if sensing his thoughts, Pitch turned to speak to him directly.

"Do you remember when I read those magic books in that fool wizard's library?" the Nightmare King asked with a sly smile. "Well, the entrapment spell was not the only trick I learned." Musingly, he added, "It is such a powerful feeling, holding another's fate in your hands. I find I quite like it."

Ignoring the brewing anger of the Guardians, Pitch turned his gaze onto the wooden shard in his grip. Cocking his head to the side slightly as he studied it, his next words came as a chilling forewarning of his intentions.

"How quickly do you think this would burn?"

* * *

"What am I going to tell my mom?"

Jamie's tentative question was sudden, and broke the somber silence that had enveloped the trio ever since they separated from Bunny. As soon as they had made it out of the raging wind Tooth had utilized her snowglobe-one of three North had given to each of them-to transport both herself and her two charges safely back to Burgess. She now fluttered above the two children at the edge of the woods, looking up the well-worn dirt track that led directly to the loose boards on the fence surrounding the Bennetts' yard.

Tooth had not really taken note of the unusual silence emanating from the two children during the brief trip home, her mind caught up in worry, not just for Jack, but for the other three now equally submerged in Pitch's lair. She had wanted to be there _with them_. Helping them fight whatever Pitch might choose to throw at them. She was a warrior, after all, not just the sweet fairy her legend made her out to be. She knew that the duty of ferrying the children home was just as important but, even so, the temptation _had_ been there simply to send the kids through the portal alone and go after Bunny herself. Tooth was better than that, however. She had all but given her word to see them safely home, and, no matter how tempting the thought was, she could not simply abandon the pair.

She was glad she had not now, seeing the uncertainty and worry in young Jamie Bennett's eyes, her motherly instincts coming to the fore as she hovered lower to be closer to the pair. She didn't immediately answer, letting her gaze drift from Sophie to Jamie and back again as she took in their exhausted faces, their tired eyes, and the lingering traces of fear that bespoke of the terrible ordeal neither of them should ever have had to go through. What Pitch had done in taking them was unforgivable, and Tooth's anger at the Nightmare King was certainly not just on Jack's behalf.

Feeling a sudden need to comfort the children, she wrapped an arm about each of them and pulled them into a tight embrace, providing comfort they would no doubt shortly find in the arms of their own mother.

"I don't know, sweetie," she answered Jamie's anxious question softly. "The human world isn't my area of expertise, I'm afraid." Releasing them from the hug, she rested a hand on each of their shoulders, smiling slightly at Sophie's sleepy and adoring '_pretty_' even as she tried to provide Jamie with some meaningful advice. "Perhaps you could tell her that you got lost?"

That, at least, was not a lie. For, even if the manner by which they had lost their way was far from conventional, Jamie and Sophie had still certainly been unable to find their own way home.

"I'm not supposed to go deep enough into the woods to _get_ lost," Jamie confessed, fidgeting slightly as he twisted his hands together.

Tooth smiled gently, understanding the boy's concern, but knowing that telling Jamie's mother the full truth would not resolve anything. The age when adults often believed in the same magic as their children was over, and had been a thing of the past for some time now. It was, she felt, a loss to the world, that the wonder of so many beliefs had faded and been brushed aside by the new age. What was gone was gone, however, and there was no happiness to be found in grieving for a past that could not be restored.

"I'm sure your mother will just be glad to know your home safe," she said kindly, patting him fondly on the head. "You shouldn't keep her waiting."

"Yeah." He nodded slowly, offering her a feeble grin, and Tooth made a mental note to insure the boy received the best memories she had in her keeping over the next few days. "Thanks, Tooth."

Looking trepidatiously across at his house, Jamie took his sister's hand and moved to step away, only to pause and turn quickly back to the fairy.

"You'll come tell us, won't you?" he requested pleadingly. "What happened to Jack? If he's alright?"

"I'll find a way to let you know," she promised faithfully, her heart warming at the devotion the boy had for the winter spirit. Jack had certainly chosen his first believer well. It would have been difficult to find a more fervent follower. "Now, go on home, where it's safe."

Jamie nodded, and Tooth waited just long enough to see him and his sister safely through the hole in the fence before taking out the snowglobe again. She didn't know if it could take her back to Pitch's lair, but at the very least it could get her close, and she had no intention of going meekly back to the Pole to wait for the others.

She owed Pitch another quarter or ten, after all.

* * *

Jack had tried to focus on the events unfolding before him. Had desperately tried to keep his mind on the present, on the verbal war being staged all around him. But in the end he couldn't. He couldn't because his mind kept stumbling back into the horror Bunny had plucked him from, and the words of the past echoed so much louder inside his head than those being uttered now. He couldn't _see_, his world a bizarre mixture of colors and cacophonic sounds that made him want to bury his head in his hands and just _hide _for as long as he could. But he didn't move, because he realized with a suddenness that brought with it a certain amount of clarity that what he was seeing was images, and what he was hearing was voices.

Just not from the present.

Sights moved past his eyes in flashes too quick for him to identify, and he squinted, trying to make out more than just a blur from amongst the myriad of colors. He recognized snatches, saw pieces of his own life both recent and not, and then the voices all around him suddenly became audible.

"_Is there anything you would _not_ do to protect them_?" Pitch's voice sounded loud and clear, just as it had when he had first addressed those words at the winter spirit, but Jack did not _see_ Pitch, he saw Jamie and Sophie and a frozen lake that had been meant to stir up the worst memories his mind contained.

"_Jack_…" Brown eyes he knew so well and yet did not know at all stared at him, brimming with tears of fear that made his heart twist painfully. "_I'm scared_."

Pitch's laughter, dark and chilling, filled the air around him.

"_It was _my_ doing_," the Nightmare King said. "_You _still _don't even know her _name."

Bunny, so angry and _hurt _and _desperate._

"_We should _never_ have trusted you_!"

Tooth's voice, trembling with loss.

"_Everything is gone_."

North, exhausted and defeated.

"_Jack, where _were_ you_…?"

Pitch, sincere and pained.

"_To have a _family_."_

Words and voices ran together in his mind, images clashed and changed and things he knew to be real became not as falsities became true. He tried to shut the voices out, tried to ignore the bewildering colors blinding him as he shut his eyes tight, but there was no blocking out the noise that came from inside his own mind.

"_Why are you doing this?_"

"_You can't _kill_ fear, Jack._"

"_You had us worried_."

"_We are alike, you and I._"

"_You _protected_ them_."

"_I know how this ends_."

"Clearly you are more forgiving than I."

"_Just trust us_."

"_Perhaps it is not about me winning_."

"_Jack, what have you done_?"

"_Maybe, I want what you have._"

"_I _saved _her_."

"_What do you fear_?"

"The other seasonal spirits do not quite have your flair for destruction, Jack."

"_You weren't yourself_."

"You _did this_."

"_What did he offer you?_"

"It is not as though anyone noticed their absence...A few months ago, no one would have noticed yours."

"_They'll believe in both of us_."

"_I'm just glad you're okay_."

"_That's why he chose me_."

"_To have a _family_."_

_"Jack, help!_"

"Why would I _help_ you, when I can do _this_."

"_Nothing to be sorry for…your fault…they'll believe…to have a _family_…you're fault…they'll believe…don't _protect_ children…you're fault…they'll believe…how this ends…you're…believe…believe_…_YOU'RE FAULT…_"

"Stop!" He couldn't stand it any longer, and finally caved into the urge to cover his ears with his hands. "Stop it _now_!"

The silence that fell in the wake of his outburst was utter and complete, broken only by the winter spirit's own ragged, stuttering breaths as he cowered away from an enemy that could not be escaped. He felt afraid. So very, _very _afraid, but he didn't understand _why _and everything seemed so dark and he was so confused and…and…

Hands he noticed only in a belated sense tightened about his shoulders as a familiar voice sounded gently above him. "Jack, are you alright?"

He opened his eyes, icy-blue clashing with a hue just as vibrant, but before he could even process what he had been asked, let alone _answer _it, a far less welcome speaker entered the fray.

"Ah, Jack. How nice of you to finally join us. And just in time for the finale."

Turning around slowly, Jack instantly forgot what North had asked, his attention fixated by the wooden shard currently dangling from Pitch's fingers above a hungry flame all too ready and willing to devour it. The soft hum he could almost _hear_ coming from the fragment was growing more and more urgent, and he stared at the piece of himself in his enemy's hand, knowing it was likely the last time he was ever going to see it.

Because, in all honesty, it did not matter that Bunny and Sandy were standing, primed and ready to attack the moment Pitch made his move. It didn't matter that Pitch could very well receive the beating of his life if he went through with what he was clearly considering in more than just a passing sense. None of that mattered, because Pitch's goal was not immediate victory, but the slow decay of his enemies and the chance, no matter how long it took to achieve, to stand above them and watch them squirm just as he had.

Helpless.

Invisible.

Not believed in.

_"Perhaps it is not about me winning," _Pitch's earlier words echoed in the back of his mind a second time_. "Perhaps it is simply about insuring your precious Guardians _never_ can."_

Pitch wanted nothing but this revenge. There wasn't a single thing they could offer him that would make him reconsider this course of action.

"_They'll believe in both of us_."

Or perhaps there _was_.

It was an insane idea, and Jack had no idea from whence it had sprung. It was easily the longest of all long shots, with the potential to estrange him from the Guardians forever. But it was a risk he was going to have to take. He _needed_ that shard. Because, even if what he had done had all been an illusion, the fact he was _capable _of it was not, and the horrible image that had triggered the cause of the sheer debris around him was now firmly engraved in his mind. He couldn't forget it, nor could he ignore the fact it was still possible that terrible, _terrible _illusion could still come true. He needed his staff back in one piece, and if that meant making a deal with the Boogeyman, then so be it.

_"Is there anything you would _not_ do to protect them_?" Pitch had asked when this whole, devastating nightmare had begun.

The answer was _no_. There was _nothing _he would not do.

"_Wait_, please."

Taking three steps forward, out of North's grasp to stand in front of Bunny, Jack made himself the focus of the Nightmare King's gaze, a place he simultaneously wanted and did not want to be. His mind was racing, picking up on every little clue Pitch had given during their fight months ago and again in the more recent past, searching for the way out, the means that would see this end in a way that wouldn't cause him an immense amount of pain and strip him of everything he had only just discovered. The words came readily when he sought them, spilling from his lips in a desperate rush to forestall any action on Pitch's part. To make him stop and _think_.

"You don't have to do this, Pitch. We can_ help _you," he continued persistently, Pitch's amber gaze bearing into his eyes and assuring him he had the dark spirit's full attention. "We can find a way to make children believe that doesn't involve terrifying them out of their wits. We can…we can find your place in the world."

"Jack!" Bunny hissed warningly, and the winter spirit took another step forward to avoid the paw that reached to pull him back. He couldn't stop. Not now. Too much depended on that tiny, insignificant little shard, and he _wasn't _ready to _lose it all_. "What the bloody hell are you doing?"

"Have you ever considered the fact you bring fear to children because you are meant to teach them courage?"

Jack kept his eyes on Pitch, ignoring Bunny and the other Guardians, something he would no doubt regret later. But he couldn't afford to think about that right now. Couldn't even think of the festering anger and grief still whirling about at the back of his mind as a result of the Nightmare King's earlier words and actions, because he only had _one chance_ to get that shard back, and everything, _everything_ balanced on him making this _work_. So he called instead upon the musings that had wandered through his mind on the numerous occasions he had found himself wrapped in solitude. On the times when the empathy he shared with the Nightmare King had led him to try and find a solution to the problem that was Pitch's perpetual exile. He had thought this over so _many_ times in the wake of Pitch's failed ploy, and now he prayed that those seemingly wasted hours would finally yield results.

"Have you ever thought that fear is a way to keep kids safe from dangers they wouldn't otherwise acknowledge? Or even that you could use that fear to protect children, to drive away bullies and the like?"

Pitch continued to watch him in considering silence, and Jack hastened onwards.

"Fear doesn't have to be a bad thing," he stated persuasively, "Just like cold doesn't. You can be better, and, even if it takes a while for kids to believe in you, you won't have to be alone. You said…you said you were _tired _of being cast out, being an outsider, we can _change _that. Just…_please_, don't do it."

Utter silence fell in the wake of his impromptu speech, neither the Guardians nor Pitch speaking a word, and Jack stood absolutely still, holding his breath as he observed the many flickering emotions on the Nightmare King's face. He refused to look at the shard in the dark spirit's hands. The tiny fragment of wood upon which his end fate balanced.

_Please_, he willed. _Take the chance. Save us both_.

"I have underestimated you, Jack," Pitch said at last, and there was something like wonder in his tone. "You have a child's wisdom," he added pensively. "As well as a child's abundant capacity for forgiveness."

For a moment, just a precious, brief, _ecstatic_ moment, Jack thought he might have finally gotten through to Pitch. But that moment lasted only an instant, and then it was gone.

"But it is far too late for that offer to be made," Pitch continued, cruelty and malice creeping into his expression as he smiled, Jack's heart thundering wildly in his chest. "I am sorry, however, that you must pay the price for _their_ mistakes."

"_No_!"

Jack started forward, but didn't make it more than a step, his hand outstretched in an ultimately futile gesture, before Pitch loosened his fingers and allowed the shard to fall into the fire burning merrily in his open palm.

And, just as the shard fell, Jack, too, dropped like a stone.


	15. Chapter 14: Nightmare's Victory

**A/N: Hey, guys, and sorry about the slightly late posting. I normally post earlier in the day than this, but things are a little bit hectic for me now. That said, I would like to give you guys a headsup that my update schedule might go out of the window over the next month or so. I am currently working as a blueberry picker so I'm hardly ever at home, and normally exhausted once I am. I will still endeavor to post once a week, but I can't guarantee it will be in the middle of the week as it has been. It'll more likely go to weekend updates from here on in.**

**Also, this is where the book references get kind of heavy, and liberties are taken. Proceed at your own risk.**

**And finally, I'd like to give a special shout out this chapter to all those lovely guest reviewers from the last one. You're all lovely people. :-D**

**Read, review, and enjoy!**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**P.S: The Hobbit was great. Only movie I have ever gone back to watch twice in the cinema. XD**

**CHAPTER 14**

**-Nightmare's Victory-**

Tooth, like all the original Guardians, had been a part of the world for a long, _long_ time. She had borne witness to countless tragedies, miracles, and joyous occasions. She had seen so many happy memories. So many sad. So many wishful thoughts and hurts that not even a Guardian could heal. She had seen the cruelty of an adult world at war and what that could do to the children forgotten in the wake of conflict. She had seen belief flourish and die. She had seen friendships formed and shattered. She had watched close friends become bitter enemies or simply drift apart as time wore on.

How many times had she watched the impossible unfold?

How many times had she been surprised, both pleasantly and not, by the amazing innocence of children and their capacity to see beauty and purity where others could not?

Jack was not innocent. He had lived far too long for that, and, though still a child at heart, he trod the borders of adulthood; borders he would never cross. Tooth was well aware his youth allowed him to view the world in a way the other Guardians struggled to. That it was the resilience of his inner child that had allowed him to survive his isolation without succumbing to bitterness and hatred. But, whilst she was constantly surprised by the acts of kindness and forgiveness children were capable of, she could scarcely believe what was unfolding before her.

Though she had managed to find her way back inside Pitch's lair and even to the other Guardians without trouble, she had held back from actually joining her comrades, concealed in the shadows in case surprise was needed. Now she listened in mounting astonishment as the Guardian's youngest member made the Nightmare King an offer that had only been presented to him once before, _centuries_ ago. That the winter spirit could still reach out to Pitch, even if it was only an attempt to retrieve something that was clearly as valuable to him as any limb, after _everything _the Nightmare King had done took her wholly by surprise.

She did not know what to feel. Anger at Jack for offering Pitch so much after all he had done. Wonder that Jack _could_ still offer such a thing when he had been a victim of the dark spirit's cruel works. Disbelief at the way Pitch visibly paused to think on the winter spirit's words, actually _considering_ them. And then _fear_, pure _fear _as she saw the Nightmare King harden his resolve, the surprise that had stained his face fading beneath cruelty. Just as he had the first time someone had opened their hearts to him enough to offer him a hand of friendship, Pitch turned down what the deepest, _brightest_, _purest _part of him desired, and let the monsters that had devoured most of the man he once was dictate his actions.

But she forgot all that-forgot Pitch _entirely_-when the flames roared forth with a sudden, bright flare to consume the wooden shard. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as wood met fire, and the moment of ignition would remain engraved in her mind for a long time to follow, accompanied by the horrifying image of Jack jerking to a halt in midstride with rigid stiffness that made him appear more like a wooden toy than a living spirit, and then plunging to the floor like a limp ragdoll.

Tooth was not certain she had ever moved so fast in her life before as she did in that moment, darting across the room so swiftly _she_ was the one to catch Jack in his descent, beating all three of the other, _nearer_ Guardians as she lowered the teenage immortal to the stone floor, cradling his head in her lap as she did so. Jack lay unmoving in her arms, limp and so terribly, _terribly _still.

"Jack?" she spoke uncertainly, refusing to believe what she was seeing. "Jack! _Wake up_!"

He didn't stir. She wasn't even sure he was _breathing_, and anger twisted with fear to create sheer _fury_ as she turned to Pitch.

"_What _did you _do_ to him?" she demanded irately, her vision impaired by the red haze of wrath descending upon her. If she hadn't been cradling Jack in her arms, she would have _hurled_ herself at the Nightmare King.

Pitch merely smiled, brushing ash off his hands. Tooth choked, on rage or grief she could not tell, but Pitch spoke before she could recover enough to utter a noise more meaningful than an outraged cry.

"What needed to be done."

Before the Nightmare King could say anything else Sandy, in a movement almost too swift to follow, snapped out a sand whip that wrapped around Pitch's wrist and drew him in close, well within range of the many hands willing to wreak revenge upon him.

"Uh-uh." Shockingly, Pitch did not show the slightest sign of alarm at the Sandman's actions. "You aren't going to hurt me. _Any _of you. I'm the only one who knows how to fix this."

"Then you'd better start talking _really_ fast," Bunny informed him, his whole frame trembling with contained rage. "What the bloody hell do you want, you…you shadow-sneaking _rat_!"

"Words were never your strong point, Bunnymund, so _do_ shut up." With deliberate grace, Pitch wrenched his hand free of Sandy's failing weaves, the four Guardians closing rank around their fallen member, all eyes fixed distrustfully on their most hated enemy and, by some, twisted, cruel turn of fate, their most needed source of knowledge.

"You keep asking me that. What do I want? What do _I_ want?" Pitch held up as his hands as he continued, "Well, I already have it. Here you stand, at _my _mercy. Helpless, useless, and _powerless_. It may not be the whole world, it may not be your believers, but that does not mean you aren't _failing_ in your duty. I wonder…did you take an oath amongst yourselves to make up for past mistakes? Did you _swear_ to do better? To make Frost feel like he had a _home_ with you? A _family_ perhaps?"

He laughed darkly, and Tooth felt her chest tighten as her anger once more began to surge. How _dare _he. How _dare_ he mock them after _everything _he had done. He had been offered a chance of redemption and had refused it. Not once, but _twice_. Yet he still had the audacity to face them with _bitterness_ for his fate. The Big Four were known as the first Guardians, and that was true, but they had not always been the _only_ Guardians, and Toothiana still remember a bright, pure, brave young woman who had looked into Pitch's dark self and seen a light lurking in the shadows. A girl who had believed redemption was possible for the once hero, the general who had been a beacon of hope for his people. Pitch had crushed that hope, had extinguished that once bright light, just as he was crushing theirs now, and Tooth had had _enough_.

Placing Jack gently on the ground with a tenderness that belied the tempest raging inside her she rose into the air, pushing her way past the other three Guardians and ignoring the anxious, cautioning glances they sent her way as she stood before Pitch to face him in all her proud ire.

"What do _you_ know of family?" she spat angrily, staring him down without a trace of fear. She had no room for that beside the rage lurking in her heart. "What do you know of _home_? You have _neither_, and you _deserve_ neither."

"And who are you to judge, _fairy_?" It was not easy to see, but the thread of venom beneath those words was enough to let her know she had stirred something inside of him, and evoked a reaction other than smug triumph. She was not entirely prepared for the assault he made in return, however, and it was with shock that she listened to his next words. "_You_ were the reason for your parents' _death_. They were executed on _your_ behalf!"

Her hand flew on reflex, and she _slapped_ him as hard she could. There was not enough force behind the gesture to knock out another tooth, but it left her hand stinging and a red imprint on his cheek that did not at all ease the seething cauldron of emotion inside of her.

"Don't you _dare_," she said furiously. "Don't. You. _Dare_."

Pitch absently raised one hand to trace the bruising on his cheek, and then he smiled at her, and it took _everything_ in her power to hold herself back, to remember that they might still need the answers Pitch's held. Taking a step back, Pitch spread his arms wide to encompass them all, his smile stretching into a full-blown, exhilarated grin.

"You are a wonderful bunch of failures, really," he laughed delightedly, his eyes bright with the euphoria of the power he now held. "North, who couldn't even protect a girl who adored him more than anyone else in the world. Bunnymund, who failed his _entire_ race. Toothiana, whose very _existence _sealed the fate of her parents. And Sandy, whose dreams are his own worst enemies. And you call yourselves _Guardians_?"

"Enough games, Pitch!" North's temper, a far milder thing now than it had ever been in his youth, finally reached its breaking point, and Tooth found herself flanked by the large Russian. "Give us what we need, and we _may_ let you go in one piece."

"Can you even _hear_ yourself, North?" Pitch mocked him without restraint. "What do you think you can do to me? You _can't_ kill fear. It's impossible. No matter what you do, I will _always_ return. I will claw my way back from the shadows. Back from whatever hole you see fit to bury me in. I will _always_ be here to stand in your way, that is a _promise_. You will pay for what you have done, and so will anyone who offers you aid or goes so far as to speak good of your name. If I can't crush you, I will crush everyone you know and care about, and I will _make you_ watch!"

"You're insane!" Tooth burst out, no longer able to keep her peace, and honestly horrified at how far Pitch had degenerated. There was no _reason_ to this madness of his. No end goal besides an insatiable need to see them suffer. She still remembered the fear and horror that had been on the dark spirit's face as the Nightmares dragged him away, and the horrifying thought occurred to her that, somehow, they had _pushed_ him to this.

"And whose fault is _that_?" Pitch answered her readily. "I hope you all _drown_ in the knowledge of what you have caused. You can join Frost. I'm sure he'd appreciate the company. Drowning is such a _lonely_ business, after all."

"Drowning?" North echoed blankly. "What…?"

He got no further as Pitch laughed outright, throwing his head back a moment before turning to them with a look of pure enjoyment. "Do not tell me you don't _know_?" He studied them, and, if it was possible, his elation seemed to grow. "I don't _believe_ this! How can you be so ignorant? Oh, this makes everything so much _better_. How can you _possibly_ hope to help Frost when you know so _little_ about him? _I_ know more than you do!"

"I've heard just about enough," Bunny muttered under his breath, turning to the Guardian of Dreams. "Smash him to bits, Sandy."

"No!" North commanded, stepping firmly between an all-too-ready Sanderson and Pitch. "Wait." Pausing just long enough to make certain he would not be on the receiving end of his fellow Guardian's whips, North then turned to Pitch. "Tell us how to fix."

"You can't fix it, you _dullard_," Pitch said without concern. "It's irreversible. There's nothing you can do to help him. There is no way to repair what was broken now." Pitch paused, then sneered, "Salvation is denied. I _win_."

There was no holding Sandy back this time, his whips cracking with ferocious intensity as he slung them at the Nightmare King. But, ruined or not, they still stood within Pitch's lair, and it was all too easy for the dark spirit to fade away into the shadows he had created, plunging right through the floor beneath them and vanishing before any of them could land a single blow. Over the top of the furious roaring in her ears, Tooth heard Bunny cursing the Nightmare King with every word available to him, North choosing to mutter in his native tongue, whilst Sandy gestured angrily with his creations, images appearing and dispersing with a violence that easily conveyed the normally mild-tempered Guardian's agitation.

Forcing herself to acknowledge the fact that Pitch had escaped for now, Tooth turned her attention back to Jack, darting to his side in an effort to alleviate her fears.

"Is he…?" Bunny asked hesitantly, and Tooth, overwhelmed with relief and suffering from too much emotional backlash, shook her head long before she had summoned the strength to actually speak.

"He's still breathing," she reassured herself and the others. "He's not fading."

"Yet," North cautioned, even as he crouched beside Tooth and the prone Jack, Sandy hovering worriedly over all three. "We all heard Pitch. Without staff, Jack…"

He couldn't finish, and the four Guardians stared at each other helplessly, all feeling the cold, bitter reality of defeat. Pitch hadn't _won_. He had not harmed the children and the majority of his Nightmares were destroyed, as was his sanctuary, something Tooth was not sure had been planned. She hadn't borne witness to the majority of the events that had taken place in the hollowed out caverns, however, so she could not really say for certain. But, though he had not _won_, neither could they claim victory. There was no triumph to be found in the events of the day, the only beacon of hope amongst the shadow the fact both Jamie and Sophie were back with their mother, safe from Pitch's clutches.

"We should get 'im back to the Pole," Bunny said at last, breaking the dread-enveloped silence that had fallen. "Maybe…Maybe we can figure out a way to fix this there."

"Yes, we must consult library!" North exclaimed, suddenly all energy. "And Manny! Manny will know what to do!"

Tooth felt her hope soar briefly at the mention of the Man in the Moon and the possibility he could possess a solution to their troubles, but that same hope was brought crashing to the ground by the recollection that, when it came to Jack, Manny was more apt _not_ to interfere. He could well be their last chance to rectify the damage Pitch had caused, however, so Tooth did not state her doubts aloud, reluctantly conceding Jack to North's hold as the Christmas spirit held out his arms. She would not remind the other Guardians that Manny had not _spoken _with them for centuries, and had instead used the light of moonbeams as a means of communication in the place of words. She would let them keep that hope.

Even if she herself had none.


	16. Chapter 15: The Seed of Darkness

**A/N: Hi guys, and sorry about the lateness of this chapter. As expected my free time has been somewhat severely inhibited by my current obligations, but rest assured that I am still working on this story. I actually have the whole thing planned right out to the end and have written the epilogue. Now I just have to figure out how to connect point A to B smoothly and it'll be all done. This chapter probably doesn't have the answers most of you are hoping for, and it's not as well revised as I would like, but it's half past eleven right now and I'm too tired to care. Sue me. XD  
**

**Read, review, and enjoy, and once more thank you for your patience. Your all lovely people.  
**

**Cheerio,  
**

**Cheekyrox  
**

**CHAPTER 15**

**-The Seed of Darkness-**

Stillness.

It was a state of being Sandy often found himself longing for whenever he visited North's workshop. He enjoyed quiet himself. A tranquil, restful, peaceful place where he could drift off whenever he wished to, not the rowdiness of the constant activity that was the North Pole. North's workshop was never still, and, whilst admittedly Sandy could fall asleep practically anywhere, the sheer amount of pandemonium that took place inside the factory on a daily basis was something he tended to try and avoid. Sandy preferred stillness, the silence of a fine night where nothing but the night animals disturbed the tranquility and the sky above was a starlit canopy drenched in the silver light of the moon.

Sandy preferred stillness, but right now he was hoping for the opposite.

Jack had not stirred since Pitch burnt the staff shard and, were it not for the fact the winter spirit was still breathing, Sandy could almost have believed that Jack was in the first stage of fading. It was unnatural for the Guardian of Fun to be so motionless when normally Jack was the paragon of a child's inability to stay still. He rocked on his heels when he was standing. Shifted his weight. Twitched his hands. Twirled his staff. Wandered back and forth. Jack's constant movement was one of the things Sandy had come to expect from the winter spirit, and to see him now, hands folded across his stomach, eyes closed and limbs lax, planted an unwelcome seed of helpless fear in the back of the Guardian of Dream's mind. This wasn't _right_, could never be right, and yet, though he _knew _the scene before him was utterly wrong, there was nothing he could do to change it.

Heaving a silent sight, Sandy straightened in his chair slightly, letting his gaze wonder over the other two Guardians who had chosen to join him in his vigil. Tooth was seated on the side of the bed, her wings unmoving, her attention focused on their injured comrade as she stroked Jack's hair gently, whispering words too quietly for the Sandman to hear a single one. Bunny was folded into the window seat against the opposite wall, one of North's large tomes in his hands as he scanned the pages for an answer to their troubles. \

An answer Sandy feared he would not find.

The Guardian of Dreams unusually morbid thoughts were interrupted when the door opened and the fourth member of the still functioning quartet entered the room, a tray laden with mugs of hot chocolate in his hands that sent a sweet scent swirling about the room and alleviating, if only slightly, the sober air.

"I have sent summons," the Guardian of Wonder informed them, extending the tray to Sandy and not withdrawing it until the short Guardian had taken a mug, then moving on to the other two. "Now we must wait to see if Man in Moon answers."

"What do we do if he doesn't?" Tooth asked softly, using one hand to retrieve her own share, the other remaining tangled in Jack's silvery locks. "Pitch destroyed the shard, North. He _burnt_ it. How are we supposed to fix that?"

"We must not give up hope," North said determinedly, giving Bunny a pointed look as he shoved the third mug into the Easter Guardian's paws and took the last for himself, setting the tray to one side as he moved back across to the bed and the prone figure laid atop the covers. "Jack is giving us time to help. We must find way."

Interested by that somewhat random statement, Sandy straightened slightly, though it was Tooth who asked the question he could not have verbalized.

"What do you mean?" she inquired with a frown.

"This." North gestured with one hand at Jack. "Happened after staff was broken too. Is defense."

"Meaning what?" Bunny demanded, not moving from his corner. "Frosty's gone into a coma until we find a way to fix this so he doesn't freeze us all to death?"

"I don't think Jack had anything to do with it," Tooth responded, her scowl still in place as she puzzled out what North had deduced. "It's likely a natural defense, which means, if it's like the last time, he'll wake up in a few days."

"Then we're on a time limit," the Pooka concluded, shoving the book he had been reading away. "I'm telling you, Manny better pull through in this one or I'm going to have a few things to say to him."

Tooth nodded, but Sandy remained impassive, knowing full well there was a high likelihood they were going to have to resolve this on their own. The Man in the Moon had a great many powers, but like all spiritual entities, he had his limits, and, ever since the first time they had actually _defeated_ Pitch rather than just sending him scurrying away into another dark hole, the Man in the Moon had had less and less to do with the Guardians and their work. Sandy suspected that last battle had cost Manny as dearly as it had cost them, and he believed most of the other Guardians suspected the same.

"Perhaps we should look at other ideas," North suggested after the silence had stretched a little too long for comfort. "Just in case."

"I'd like to have another look at Pitch's lair." Bunny was on his feet in a second. "Just because that old shadow-slinker vanished doesn't mean he's actually left the place. I might be able to take him by surprise, and, even if he's not there, we need to make sure he can't use that place again. I'll take some of my egg warriors and rip the place apart."

"Is that a good idea?" Tooth cautioned, looked worried as she set her now-empty mug aside. "That place could be full of traps."

"I know how to look before I leap, Toothiana," Bunny reminded her curtly. "And I'm not leaving that place for him to use again. On kids. On us. On _anyone_."

"Bunny is right," North agreed. "We need to make sure lair is gone." Striding across the room he picked up the volume Bunny had discarded, tucking it under one arm as he turned back to his fellow Guardians. "I will search library. See if any information can be found there, and wait for Manny to reply."

"I should probably get back to the palace," Tooth said regretfully. "I need to check on my fairies, and Baby Tooth will want to come back here now that we have Jack…"

The fairy trailed away as all three of his fellow Guardians turned to look at Sandy, seeking his approval for the task they had wordlessly appointed to him. Sanderson let his gaze wander to the prone figure of the Guardian's newest and youngest member, before shifting his gaze to his comrades and giving them a smile and nod. He could weave his dreams from Jack's room if need be, and, truthfully, he had absolutely no intentions of leaving the boy unaccompanied.

"Is settled then," North announced. "We will go do what needs to be done. Sandy will stay here. I shall send Phil to help."

Inclining his head in acknowledgement of the gesture, Sandy used his dreamsand to float his chair closer to the bed, settling in for what would likely prove to be a long and worrying wait.

* * *

Jack knew something was wrong.

It was instinct. One of those things you just _knew_. A sixth sense that hovered at the back of your mind and tingled down your spine. He couldn't name it. Couldn't place it. Couldn't tell _why_ he felt it. But he knew it was true, and that…_that_ was all that really mattered. Even though he acknowledged it, however, and knew it to be a genuine warning, he could not find the cause of its existence. The scene before him could not have been a more happy one, or a more _welcome_ one. Spread out before him, seated upon a pleated blanket with a basket full of his favorite foods divvied out between them, was his family. His beautiful mother. His sister. The blond girl and brown-haired boy who had flashed through his memories as a part of his family that was never named. They were all smiling at him in greeting, his mother beckoning him forward, and yet he could not go to them, and the sense of wrongness grew with each second that passed with him immobile.

He blinked, and suddenly the picnic in the woods was gone, and he was standing instead inside a familiar bedroom, the moonlight leaking through the cracks in the curtains not enough to alleviate the darkness that seemed to linger inside the room. The soft sound of crying permeated the stillness, and he turned to see a small, huddled figure seated atop one of the beds, crying softly into her knees as she wrapped her hands tightly about her legs. Concerned, he approached her bedside, but recoiled when a familiar, coiling shadow emerged from beneath the frame and wrapped itself around the girl's shoulder in a twisted mimic of a comforting hold.

"That's right," a voice whispered, and he whirled, looking for Pitch but unable to see him anywhere. "You left her _alone_. And scared. And _sad_. Look at her, Jack." He didn't want to listen, but found his eyes drawn anyway to the miserable, huddled figure of a young child who had been ecstatic with excitement mere hours ago. The shadow tightened its hold, and his sister squeezed her legs even tighter, her knuckles going white. "Look what you did."

He shook his head vehemently, refusing to justify the sourceless whisper by answering it as he stepped closer to the grief-stricken girl, taking a seat on the bed and reaching out to bat away the shadows. They gave beneath his touch, but when he tried to rest his hand on her shoulder, to provide comfort, he found his hand simply passed right through her. The girl shivered, moving away from the coldness he brought with him, and Jack was left seated, his hand outstretched and his body frozen as an unwelcome sense of shock washed over him.

"Did you really think that would work?" the whisper asked, hints of laughter in its tone, and suddenly it didn't sound like Pitch anymore. Startling to his feet and whirling, Jack found himself standing face to face with Bunny, the Pooka's arms folded and a fierce scowl on his face. "That _you_ could comfort her? What do _you_ know about bringing joy to children, Frost? You're not a Guardian, and you never will be."

"You're not real," Jack muttered defiantly, shaking his head as he took a step back, forcing himself to remember how it was Bunny who had stopped him when he lost his control. Bunny who had comforted him. Bunny who had _not_ abandoned him. "You're _not_ real."

"Aren't I?" the not-Bunny smirked. "How do you know that, Jack? How do you know that what you remember is real? How do you know that this isn't? How do you know that what you thought was an illusion, what _I_ told you was an illusion, wasn't the truth? How do you _know_?"

"Because it _can't_ be real," Jack insisted, holding on to the slim tether of hope that told him it _wasn't_. That _this_ Bunny was the one who was lying, and not the one he remembered holding him so tightly it hurt and forcing him to meet green eyes as the truth was drummed into him with unforgiving, unrelenting force. "It _can't_."

"Maybe," the not-Bunny shrugged carelessly. "But _this_ is."

He gestured with one paw, and Jack unwittingly found himself turning to look at the sad little girl folded into the very corner of her bed. Her pillow was now clutched against her chest, her tear-filled eyes staring at the door to the bedroom as if waiting for him to simply walk in and sweep her up in the protection of an older brother's embrace. It wouldn't happen, Jack knew, which made the bare hope in her expression all the more heartbreaking. The shadows were back again, looping about her head and settling on her hair, and Jack moved to chase them off a second time only to find a firm paw wrapped around his wrist.

"You can't change the past, mate," not-Bunny told him. "This has already happened, and nothing you can do _now_ is going to make it better. Guess you should have tried harder to remember when it would have _mattered_."

"I did try!" he cried in protest, whirling on the phantom. "I _did_ try. It wouldn't come."

"And who do you have to blame for that?" not-Bunny demanded, a victorious smirk working its way across his furry face. "It was the Man in the Moon and the Guardians who kept your memories from you, Jack. They're the reason you weren't there for her. The reason you failed her."

"_No_!" He ripped his arm away, backing up away from the doppelganger until his back hit the wall. "I know what you're trying to do, and it won't work!"

"But it's the truth, Jack." Bunny was gone, replaced suddenly by Tooth, who fluttered forward to trap him in the corner with a gentle smile. "I had your memories all along. I could have helped you long, long ago. But I didn't."

"You didn't know," he whispered. "It wasn't you're fault."

"Are you sure?" she cocked her head to the side, reaching out to lay a hand on his shoulder exactly as she had done that night in Jamie's bedroom. "Or did I just not _want_ you to remember? Your teeth made wonderful leverage, after all, when we needed you."

"You wouldn't do that to me," he insisted, shaking his head vehemently. "You _wouldn't_."

"But are you _sure_?" She removed her hand, and was gone a second later, leaving him pressed against the wall suddenly breathless, still listening to the quiet sniffles of the troubled youngster seated a short distance from him.

Pushing himself off the wall cautiously, wary of another phantom appearing at any moment, Jack moved to the bedside, crouching beside it but taking care not to touch his sister again.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, knowing she could not hear him, but needing to say _something_ nonetheless. "I'm sorry I couldn't save you from this. I'm sorry I couldn't stop Pitch from hurting you. I'm sorry I ever took you out onto that ice in the first place. It was my fault. It was all my fault, and I'm _sorry_. But…But please don't be sad. I'm alright, really. I want you to be happy. That's all I ever wanted."

His sister turned suddenly, her tear filled, brown eyes focusing, not on the wall behind him, but on his face. Jack froze, taken aback by the fact she could actually _see_ him, then reared backwards in shock at the venom that came from her lips.

"I hate you!" she shouted, grief suddenly replaced by fury. "I _hate_ you! Why are you here? You left! You _left _me and I _hate_ you!"

"No…No I didn't…" he tried to protest, but her words had stripped him of the ability, and all he could do was stand there, staring at the little sister he had loved above all else and drinking in the sickening knowledge that he had left her like this. At Pitch's mercy. "I'm _sorry_."

"It's a pity, isn't it?" The whisper was back, and Jack stiffened as a phantom touch, cold and dark, settled upon his shoulder. "That sorry doesn't fix anything."

The bedroom faded away, and he was left standing in absolute darkness, all alone with nothing but his turbulent and _hurting_ emotions to keep him company. Even the dark whisper abandoned him, and he suddenly couldn't take it anymore. He _fought_ back. Striking out against the shadows trying to consume him and desperately trying to find his way out of what he _had_ to believe was a nightmare. This couldn't be true. He wouldn't _let_ it be.

For the longest time it seemed there was no way out, that he would be trapped here forever, then suddenly his hands found purchase and he pushed past the exhaustion clinging to him. For the first time since this whole ordeal had begun, he was aware of the fact he was awakening. He all but clawed his way to the surface, through a sludge of inky blackness that seemed to smother everything, and gasped like someone who had spent too long beneath water as he opened his eyes to the beige ceiling of his room at the North Pole.

Something glittered in his peripheral vision, and he blinked sharply, waiting until the golden, glimmering form had drawn near enough for him to discern features before trying to speak.

"Sandy…" The word came out a rasping whisper, and he got no further than the Guardian of Dreams' name before he became aware of the reaching tendrils of shadow threatening to drag him back under. He no longer had the strength to fight them, and so it was with a desperation born of fear that he desperately choked out, "_Help me_."

And then the darkness claimed him once more.


	17. Chapter 16: Seeking Answers

**A/N: I had a whole bunch of things I wanted to say in this Author's Note, and I can't remember any of them. *headdesks*.**

**Read, Review, and Enoy!**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 16**

**-Seeking Answers-**

Jamie Bennett could not sleep. He had tried. He had spent hours tossing from side to side, trying to find a comfortable, peaceful state of repose, but it refused to come, leaving him lying wide awake frowning up at his darkened ceiling. It was not his aching throat that prevented him from sleeping, nor the constant cough he had brought with him out of Pitch's lair, an after-affect of his impromptu dip. No, what kept him from sleeping was _worry_, pure and simply worry. Tooth had _promised_ him she would let him know what had happened, but it had been a day now and he heard nothing. What did that mean? Had any of the Guardians made it out of Pitch's lair? Or were they still down there, fighting the Nightmare King just as they had months ago, only, this time, without the children to help them?

He had no way of finding out and no way to contact the Guardians. He could have gone down to the Lake to try and see if there was any sign of Jack there, but even without his cold he was grounded, and would remain grounded until his mother forgave him for worrying her so. Tooth was right, and his mother would not have believed him even if he had told her the full truth, but Jamie still wished there was some way he could have avoided this punishment, even if it was only so he could find out what had happened to his friend.

Rolling over on to his other side for the umpteenth time he frowned at the glow of his nightlight, then jumped slightly as something darted across his line of sight. Bolting upright he winced as his chest protested against the sudden movement, biting back a cough as he turned to spot the rainbow colored creature that had found her way into his room. It was not until he set eyes on the tiny, fluttering form that he was absolutely certain his eyes had not been deceiving him, and it was with an almost silent whoop of joy that he formed his hands into a cradle for the mini-fairy hovering before him.

"Baby Tooth!" He did not have to worry about whispering, his voice barely capable of making the slightest noise right now, but he did not let that curb his excitement. "What happened? Is Pitch gone? Is Jack alright? And what about the others? Can…"

Baby Tooth cut him off with a single, shrill chirp, and Jamie fell silent, watching as the tiny fairy retrieved an envelope from her belt, slowly unfolding it again and again and again until what had been a tiny square of paper turned into a letter nearly as large as those his mother received in the post. Tentatively taking it from her, he opened the envelope, and slid the paper contained within out into his hands. The message was short, and penned in a flowing, curvy hand that could only be Tooth's. Jamie frowned as he read the brief sentences telling him that Jack had been rescued and that Pitch had vanished, looking for the extra details he felt sure must be written down somewhere, and yet finding none. Tooth had put only the bare minimum down on paper, and it was with a heaviness in his chest that had nothing to do with his cold that Jamie turned to Baby Tooth. The little sprite was looking at him with a sad expression, her eyes worried, and Jamie swallowed uneasily.

"What else happened?"

Baby Tooth chittered for a good moment before seeming to realize he did not understand a word she was saying. Her gaze darting about the room, she froze as she found what she sought, speeding across to Jamie's desk and heaving a pencil that was almost as big as she was from the stack before setting it to the notepad lying alongside the writing utensils. Casting a cautious glance towards his door, Jamie shot out of bed, running barefoot across the room to his desk. Struggling to use the giant pencil, Baby Tooth drew a rough sketch of Jack's staff, then another picture of the rod in pieces. Once drawn, she gestured somewhat frantically towards the latter image, her hands moving almost as quickly as her wings as she tried to explain. Jamie, remembering Jack's explanation for the staff's absence, did not take long to puzzle it out.

"Can't you fix it?" he asked, but Baby Tooth shook her head, picking up an eraser and dropping it over one of the shards she had drawn. "There's a piece missing?" The tiny fairy nodded emphatically, and Jamie frowned, wondering how that had happened, and then wondering how to fix it. It was in the midst of his wondering that he noticed the beam of silver light spilling through a slim crack in the curtains, shining brighter than any moonbeam he had ever seen. Curious, he allowed his gaze to follow the shaft of light to its end, where it fell upon a number of his possessions resting atop his dresser.

Moving slowly, he crossed his room to the set of drawers, his hands reaching out to touch the items indicated. No sooner had his fingers closed around the illuminated object then the moonbeam vanished, stealing out of the room as quickly as it had entered. Jamie stared after it for a few seconds, waiting for it to come back once whatever cloud blocking the moon had departed, but the beam did not return, and at last he turned back to see what it was he was holding in his hands. His eyes widened slightly as realization stole over him, and he turned to Baby Tooth in barely contained excitement.

"I need you to get something for me," he said with determination. "We're going to save Jack."

* * *

Out of all the Guardians, there was no denying that Sandy had the most practical experience when it came to tending sick children. With sleep often proving to be the best remedy, the Guardian of Dreams had often been known to take a little extra time when confronted with an ill child, just to insure their sleep would be restful and healing, or, if the latter was not possible, at the very least _comfortable_. Sometimes that was the best that Sanderson could offer, and it was then, when he knew for certain that a little dreamer might no longer be there the following night, that he took a moment to weave the sweetest, brightest, and happiest dreams he could muster. It was his way of saying goodbye to those bright little lights who too often departed from the world before they had a chance to become something more, and a duty that was both saddening and soothing in its own way.

It was understandably daunting, therefore, to find himself using the exact same method on Jack.

It was not that the winter spirit was dying-no matter what Pitch had said, Sandy was determined that that was an outcome that would never come into being-but that Pitch's actions had had an unforeseen affect on their young comrade. They should have known to look for the darkness. After the events that Bunny had related to them all, they should have _known _that a seed had been planted, and had yet to be dug out of the fertile ground it had found to grow in. They _should_ have known, but the thought had never occurred to them, and they were paying for that oversight now.

The nightmares had begun almost as soon as Jack fell back into unconsciousness, and had brought with them a raging fever that was bad by normal standards and particularly concerning given Jack's nature as a winter spirit. In his current state, feverish and insensible and unaware of everything and everyone around him, Jack posed a distinct danger to those trying to help him, and Sandy's dreamsand weaves were the only thing that seemed to truly help.

Bunny had not spared a single detail whilst relating the horror they had not all had a chance to witness unfolding in Pitch's lair, ignoring the outrage on Toothiana's face, the anger on North's, and the shock that had no doubt been reflected on Sandy's own as he recounted everything he had seen and everything that had been said. Jack was _dangerous_, the Easter Guardian had grimly stated, and when this new symptom had arisen the other three members of the Big Four had been forced to agree that, until their youngest member was fully coherent again, keeping the winter spirit slumbering, and thereby insuring his powers remained equally inert, was best for everyone.

What was _best_ for everyone, however, was not necessarily _easy_.

Sandy knew Pitch's work well, with an intimacy that none of the Guardians could possibly share, and so he instantly recognized the fact that Jack's fever did not sprout from the destruction of his staff shard alone. The same darkness the Nightmare King had used to weave his illusion was still at work in the Guardian of Fun's mind, turning Sandy's most restful dreams into the blackest of nightmares. The small Guardian was waging a war against the shadows Pitch had left in his wake, and, whilst it was a battle he was winning, that victory came in small degrees and at a high cost.

Toothiana, called back to the North Pole mere hours after leaving it, did her best to aid him, even going so far as to send Baby Tooth, just returned from her other errand, to the Tooth Palace in order to retrieve Jack's memory box and the good memories held therein. But, with Jack himself insensible, Sandy was the only one truly able to combat their invisible enemy. It was a conflict divided into multiple skirmishes, and the worth of each victory was defined by the number of minutes Jack rested peacefully. In those brief moments, Sandy was able to relax and recover, knowing another round would soon be before him. A horror such as Pitch had deliberately woven was not swiftly forgotten, after all, and Sandy feared it would be some time before Jack was able to sleep peacefully without his aid.

Most troubling of all was the fact that the illusion Pitch had woven had been built upon a base already in place. Somewhere, somehow, someone had planted the idea in Jack Frost' mind that he was a danger to children, and that somewhere within him dwelt the potential to _hurt _them. Sandy was all but certain the idea had not come from Jack himself, for the teenage immortal had surely never entertained the idea of harming children, and it angered him somewhat to consider the fact another member of the spirit world had tossed such an accusation Jack's way. What truly infuriated him, however, was the manner in which Pitch had built upon that thought, and turned it into an experience traumatic enough to cause Jack to lose whatever precarious hold he still had on his abilities. Pitch had turned him into a danger to the Guardians' believers, by showing him what could happen were he already one.

Fixing the damage the Nightmare King had caused, sealing over the cracks his horrors had wrought in Jack's mind…It would take time, care, and more than just Sandy's dreamsand. The healing process now before them was going to take an united effort on the part of the Guardians, and would truly test the family into which they had grown. For now, however, the focus remained on finding a means to restore Jack's staff, before the terrible image Pitch had shown the winter spirit became a possible reality.

"Jack?"

Tooth's quiet, tentative question drew Sandy from his deep musing, and he opened his eyes to peer across at the Guardian of Memories, hovering anxiously above the winter spirit in a manner fairly similar to that she adopted when watching her charges sleep. Jack was no longer sleeping, however, his eyelids flickering as he blinked his way out of his fitful slumber. It was not a return to full lucidity, and, even from his distant post, Sandy could see the glazed sheen spread across familiar, bright-blue eyes.

Tooth, for her part, seemed more concerned by the drenched locks plastered to Jack's forehead, or rather, the unabated fever that had caused them to be so, and busied herself with dunking a warmed, damp piece of fabric back into the bowl of icy water set at the ready. Jack's continuing pyrexia was reason for concern, but whilst it worried him that the winter spirit was so decidedly _un_frosty right now, Sandy could not help but be grateful for the added leash that heat put on Jack's powers. He was not at all grateful for the symptoms that came with that warmth, however, and readied himself to repeat a process that had already been performed countless times since their return to the Pole as soon as Jack began to turn his head restlessly from side to side, muttering and pleading beneath his breath.

"Shh, sweetie, it's alright," Tooth soothed, pressing the cool, damp washcloth against the restless spirit's forehead. Sandy, though nearing a state of utter exhaustion, rose from his chair to float across the room and sprinkle another dose of dreamsand across the Guardian of Fun, sending Jack back into a deep, less agitated slumber.

His duty done, Sandy turned to exchange a worried glance with Toothiana. Seeing the motion, Phil, sequestered away in the corner and strangely inconspicuous, warbled a worried inquiry. There was no time to answer the Yeti's question, for a moment later the door swung open, signalling Bunny's return from his self-imposed task of searching and then destroying Pitch's now abandoned lair. None of the Guardians had honestly expected to find anything of use there, but the need to do something, _anything_ to help their friend was far greater than any compunction they might have had about performing tasks that would likely have no useful outcome. At the very least, Bunny's actions had made certain that any Nightmares lingering in Pitch's former hideout would never again terrorize the world, although that was no guarantee that others did not still remain elsewhere.

As soon as Jack was cared for, Sandy meant to ensure every last Nightmare was banished from the spirit world, and with them the last of Pitch's strength.

"North's all but buried in his books," the Easter Guardian announced as he closed the door softly behind him, casting Phil a sidelong glance, before directing his attention towards the room's other three occupants. "What happened?"

"_Pitch_ happened," Tooth replied bitterly, not bothering to hide her anger. Sandy feared that, out of all the Guardians, Tooth was the most affected by all this. The fairy had already lost one family, any harm rendered upon those she now considered a part of the same cut her deeply. "Pitch and his illusions and his dark magic and…"

She trailed away as Jack stirred restlessly again, switching gears in the blink of an eye as she shushed him gently. Watching anxiously, Sandy stood at the ready, relaxing only when her ministrations proved affective. More calmly this time, she finished answering Bunny.

"Pitch left a shadow," she explained tautly. "Sandy's taking care of it, but it has to be done in degrees. Jack's not strong enough for a single blast." Wringing the wet cloth grasped between her fingers, she added, "Did you find anything?"

"Nothing but stragglers." Bunny shook his head. "Pitch has gone to ground for good this time. He obviously doesn't want us getting any answers out of him."

The chances of them getting any answers out of the Nightmare King even if they _did _find him were infinitesimal, but Sandy didn't feel the need to point that out. It had been a long shot, and Bunny had known that when he suggested he go, but they had needed to try.

"Do you think…" Tooth hesitated, before trailing off. "Has Manny answered North's summons yet?"

Bunny shifted his weight uneasily, but did not need to speak aloud to convey his response.

The Christmas Guardian was conspicuously absent, and, had he received an answer to their plea, Sandy was quite certain North would have come straight to them. Instead he was burying himself in the massive collection of tomes shelved in his library, hoping to find an answer amongst the ancient lore. Books could contain a great amount of knowledge, but Sandy feared they would not find what they sought in any of the volumes North had collected.

"What about the other spirits?" Tooth asked suddenly, turning away from her task as nursemaid to address the other two. "Has anyone tried contacting them?"

"You mean the other seasonals?" Bunny asked, sounding surprised. "Come on, Tooth. You know we haven't had dealings with them since we took Pitch down the first time."

"Really?" Tooth jerked her head up in surprise. "I thought you and the Lady of Spring were friends?"

"_Were_ being the key word there, Tooth," Bunny responded guardedly. "We had a disagreement."

Tooth, looking perplexed, inquired, "Over what?"

"I don't really see how that matters." Evasively, Bunny refused to answer. "We're not exactly on speaking terms anymore. Though, I suppose it couldn't hurt to try. I'm going to go talk to North."

Somewhat abruptly, and without bothering to give a more proper farewell, Bunny departed swiftly from the room, leaving a bewildered Tooth and Sandy in his wake.

"What was that all about?" Toothiana turned to Sandy, not bothering to hide her confusion, but the Guardian of Dreams could only shrug. His dealings with the seasonal spirits had been sporadic at best, and 'dealings' too often referred to espying each other in passing only. There had been but one occasion when the Guardians and the seasonals had worked together in any true sense, and that had been an event born out of necessity, rather than any true desire to mingle. The two parties tended to ignore each other, and the only exception to that appeared to have been severed without Sandy's knowledge.

Whatever had led to the disagreement Bunny had mentioned, Sandy could only hope it was not serious enough to prevent the Lady of Spring lending them her aid. Right now, it was looking to be about the only thing that could possibly help.

* * *

When North had been a young man, in a time that was a great deal longer than one age ago, he had studied the ways of magic and belief beneath an old wizard who would forever live on in his memory as the greatest mentor he had ever had. Even now, centuries later, he could remember how a great deal of that learning had revolved around the immense library the wizard had collected over his long life, and, in homage or habit, North had adopted that trait as his own, collecting all manner of books from all over the world and storing them on the shelves that lined each and every wall in the globe-room. There was an immense amount of knowledge contained between the many different covers. So much, in fact, that North had not yet managed to read and absorb it all, and it was to the wonders stored on those pages that he now turned, hoping to find an answer to the quandary in which the Guardians now found themselves.

When Manny had failed to answer their summons, North had briefly considered joining the other Guardians, but, knowing he could be of more use buried in his volumes, he had decided it was best to leave Jack in the capable hands of Sandy and Toothiana. With Phil adding his own expertise to cover the holes their own might leave, the winter spirit was in undeniably good hands, and, whilst North would dearly have liked to be more involved in their efforts to tend to their comrade, his self appointed task would no doubt prove far more useful in the end.

He tried to appear calm as he worked, for his own sake and that of the Yetis and elves watching him, but he knew he was failing dismally on that count. He worked his way at an astonishingly rapid rate along the hundreds of bookshelves lining the walls of the globe-room, pulling forth and discarding dozens of volumes, three Yetis following in his wake to catch and reset the books he tossed with uncharacteristic carelessness over his shoulder whenever they proved without the knowledge he sought. That the Yetis had known such would be necessary was a sure sign that they had sensed his agitation, but North did not possess the will to calm himself. Not after what had happened.

Pitch had beaten them. There was no way around that fact. He had _allowed_ them to find him just so that they could watch as he did his best to destroy their newest member. He had wanted them to drown in their own helplessness, to remember that this was not the first time they had been unable to save their own, and to despair as they realized they were helpless once more. Pitch hadn't just wanted to _beat_ them, he wanted to watch them suffer, and it grated on North that, despite everything they had already gone through, the Nightmare King was _succeeding_.

Slamming another volume shut as it proved useless to his cause, North tossed it over his shoulder, trusting the Yetis to catch it, and ending up somewhat surprised when his actions were instead greeted with a somewhat indignant yelp.

"Hey!" Bunny snapped irritably, having just snared the book from the air before it smacked him in the face. "Watch where you're tossing those things, mate!"

"You caught, no?" North pointed out, already distracted by the gold letters adorning the binding of a tome to his right. It looked promising, and he fished it from its place on the shelf to peruse its contents. "What is problem?"

"That…Oh, never mind." Huffing slightly, Bunny handed the book to the Yetis, who reverently restored it to its rightful place on the shelf. "Look, North, we need to talk. About Jack."

"Talking is no good," North said with a frown as he turned to face Bunny fully, momentarily drawing his attention away from the scrawl he had been studying. "Talking does not solve problem."

"Well, what I have in mind might," Bunny answered, not at all put off by North's abruptness. They knew each other too well for that. "North, I think we need to talk to the other seasonal spirits."

That got North's attention immediately, and the Christmas Guardian carefully closed the book in his hands, passing it off onto the Yetis as he folded his arms and raised his eyebrows at the Pooka.

"Don't look at me like that," Bunny retorted, gesturing towards the laden shelves. "I know what you're thinking, but they're going to know more about all of this than any book you have here."

Bunny had a point, North had to give him that, but the Russian man still had his doubts over how useful the seasonal spirits would prove to be. The Guardians had had interactions with them in the past. Some good. Some bad. But there was bad blood lingering between those who had once been amicable acquaintances, and North suspected that, if what Pitch had told them of his deeds was true, those ill feelings would only have worsened.

"Is true," he conceded aloud. "Question being whether they will talk to us. You heard what Pitch said."

"I heard." Bunny nodded in acknowledgement. "But I know Will. She'll talk to me."

"I was of impression you two were not speaking." North cocked his head to the side in pensive consideration, not quite as forgetful as Bunnymund no doubt hoped. "Had big fight, no?"

"I didn't say we were friends," Bunny stated defensively, though North could easily see the Pooka's relief that he had let the _cause _of that explosive argument go unspoken. "Just that she'd talk to me."

"Point taken." North nodded, turning back to his bookshelves, before thinking better of it and swinging to face Bunny. "You need backup?"

"Nah, I'll be fine," the Easter Guardian assured the big man, adding with a smirk that looked a little too artificial to be entirely genuine, "I've dealt with Jack Frost. It can't get much worse than that."

Distracted, either by their worry or their conversation, neither Guardian noticed the sliver-thin shaft of silver light that spilled in through the open skylight to skim across the surface of the great globe turning on its axis, gently illuminating a single, bright light.


	18. Chapter 17: Remembrance

**A/N: I am not happy with the way this chapter turned out. It feels like its missing something, but seeing as I've left you guys hanging for nearly a month I figured I'd just swallow my perfectionism and post it anyway. As to the lateness of posting at all, I do have a semi-excuse for that. I have a regular job now, only part-time, but if you as paranoid as I am about doing things right you spend most of the time you're not working worrying about whether you remembered to do everything right. I've been at it for two weeks now, though, so the stress levels have certainly decreased a bit, and I'm finding it easier to focus on other things. I won't promise that the next chapter will be out sooner, because I can't commit to that, but I do give you my solemn vow this story will not be abandoned. The plot is sorted right until the end, it's just a matter of writing the chapters to follow it. So thank you all for your patience. It is greatly appreciated.**

**Also, a special thank you to the latecomers who brilliantly read through the story and took the time to leave a review on every chapter, rather than just the latest one posted. Hearing your comments on every part of this story really makes my day.**

**To anyone who has not yet received a review response, I WILL get to you...eventually.**

**Read, review, and enjoy, with sincere apologies, **

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 17**

**-Remembrance-**

Bunny folded his arms and glared at his opponent, wishing, and not for the first time, that he had accepted North's offer for help. Whilst the seasonal spirits themselves were a force he could manage their appointed keeper was another matter entirely, and, without North on hand, he couldn't ask his Russian friend to simply toss the ridiculous creature before him into a sack and send him through a portal to Timbuktu.

Or outer space.

Perhaps Manny would enjoy the company, because Bunny certainly didn't.

Out of all the Guardians, he knew he was the one who struggled the most when it came to making friends. Whilst Tooth had a habit of frightening people off when she shamelessly invaded their personal space in order to assess their teeth and North had an equally off-putting habit of being all too overbearing in his joyous and wondrous ways, neither were as inept as Bunny when it came to interacting with the other members of the spirit world. The Easter Guardian tended to keep to himself, he wasn't a socialite and he didn't want to be, but his terse manners and his fierce dislike of any change to the routine that was his life made it difficult to get along with anyone he bumped in to, particularly those who caused upsets in his work. And no one, not even Jack Frost and his infamous Easter Sunday blizzard, had managed to make as much of a mess of Bunny's work as the Groundhog.

Bunny didn't mind the fact that the dull creature was often _deliberately_ wrong in his predictions about the seasonal change, taking pleasure in telling Bunny spring would be early simply to laugh at him when he leapt out of his hole then let out a holler at the persisting cold of a winter that refused to give way to the warmer season. He could deal with that with a fierce glare and a few barbed insults, that would as like or not be returned in like kind. No, what really got under his skin and made him twitch was the way the arrogant, burrowing creature had tunnelled his own passageways right through some of Bunny's routes, and then had the audacity to block up the Easter Guardian's traveling paths. Their private little war over the underground network had gone on for many a long year, even now it was not entirely settled, and the pair of them were certainly not on good terms. It chafed more than a little, therefore, for him to have to seek out the self-same spirit now, but the Groundhog was the only one besides the seasonal spirits capable of opening up the portal into the Grove, where he hoped to find the Spirit of Spring, and with her some answers.

He had been utterly taken aback, therefore, when his request was met by an unmoving refusal.

"No?" he repeated disbelieving. "What do you mean '_no_'?"

"I mean just that," the Groundhog answered him, beady eyes bearing into his own with just as much intensity as the smaller spirit mirrored his stance. "You are not welcome here, rabbit."

The amount of animosity behind those words was something new, and Bunny frowned, confused.

"Look," he began in an attempt to reason with the impossible creature. "I know Willow and I didn't part on the best of terms last time…"

"The _best_ of terms?" The Groundhog gave a snort. "You put your paw in it last time you were here and that's for sure. I ain't never seen the little lady so mad before. Proud, perhaps. Utterly stuck up and the vainest lass I know, but you had her hopping around like she was a bunny herself. Quite amusing for me, as a matter of fact. It's good to see the bossy ones get their due."

"You'll let me in, then?" Bunnymund gave up trying to puzzle out whether that last statement had been a shot at him or not in favour of pressing his point.

"No." It took the Groundhog only a moment to sober again, hostility creeping back into his voice. "If it were just about that I'd let you in in a heartbeat for the entertainment value alone, but it's not. You've dragged them into enough of your problems of late, rabbit, I'll not have you doing anything more."

"I only want to talk."

"Oh, yeah?" His fellow spirit shot him a disbelieving glance. "About what?"

Swallowing his pride with an effort and a cringe at the bitter taste, he answered with two words, "Jack Frost."

"The whippersnapper?" The Groundhog raised an eyebrow in either surprise or disbelief. "Interesting, but not enough for me to let you in."

"Oh, come on!" Swiftly losing patience, Bunny spread his paws in an appealing gesture. "I won't break anything. I won't lose my temper. And I'm not going to drag any of them off to do anything they don't want to. I just want to talk to bloody Willow so I can find a way to help my friend before what Pitch did to him bloody well _kills_ him!"

Something shifted in the Groundhog's expression, though whether it was a softening or reaffirming of his resolve Bunny could not tell. "So Pitch got at you lot too, did he?"

"Yes." The word tasted foul on his tongue, and his failure to protect his fellow Guardian fell heavily upon his shoulders, making them slump. "Please, Chuck. I need to see Willow."

The Groundhog hesitated briefly, clearly indecisive, before at last giving his head a slight nod. "Fine," he agreed reluctantly. "You can see her, but I want to show you something first."

Turning, the chubby little creature gave a sharp series of whistles, tossing a brief smirk Bunny's way as the hidden entrance to his burrow suddenly became visible. An entrance Bunny would have to crawl just to get inside. Smothering the acerbic complaints that instinctively came to mind, Bunny wordlessly followed after his guide, trying not to wince every time his limbs bashed against the sides of the underground corridor. Compared to his wide tunnels, the inner workings of the Groundhog's warren were simply cramped, and Bunny had never liked traversing their interior, especially not when the Groundhog was apt to…

The thought had not even finished crossing his mind before the ground vanished from beneath him, and he let out an undignified yelp as he tumbled through the air, crashing through bronze, leaf-laden trees to land in a pile of leaves on the forest floor. Spitting out the few he had unintentionally swallowed, he cast a glare up at the Groundhog, who smiled and waved at him cheerfully before dropping down through the same hole with as much grace as his rather limiting frame would allow, letting the hole that had allowed him entrance to the Grove seal itself once more. Scrambling to his feet, Bunny brushed a few stray leaves from his coat, before pushing his way out of the forest towards the fountain he could hear dimly bubbling beyond where he stood.

The fountain stood at the centre of the Grove, where the territory of the four seasons met in a clash of their separate colours. The Grove itself was a perfect oval, divided with equal symmetry into four distinctly unique spaces. Summer, Autumn, and Spring all shone brightly in their own way, but where winter's ice and snow had once been visible there was only blackened ground that came right up to the foot of the cheerfully gurgling fountain, as if a fire had swept through leaving nothing but ash in its wake. Bunny did not like to look on that reminder of past tragedies, and barely spared it a glance whenever he visited this place, although, this time, his distraction was for an entirely different reason.

"What happened here?" he blurted without thinking, staring in horror at the withered appearance of the three surviving seasonal territories. Trees were bent in unseemly shapes. Grass that should have been green was a bleached brown. Leaves that should have crackled with Autumn's crisp freshness hung limp and wet, utterly lifeless. Everywhere he looked there were signs of decay, of _death_, and he turned to the Groundhog in utter horror, seeking an answer to the question at the forefront of his mind.

"This is what happens when they get hurt." The Groundhog shrugged, his expression saddened. "It'll heal, like it did last time, but it will do so at its own pace."

"Where are the sisters?" Bunny asked, frowning as he realized there was no sign of any of the Grove's inhabitants.

"They're staying with me for now," the Groundhog told him simply, whistling to reopen the tunnels into his burrow. "Where they're safe."

Casting one last glance at the signs of Pitch's handiwork around him, Bunny obeyed the sharp wave the Groundhog made with one paw, hopping through the provided opening and into the space beyond. He was relieved to find himself in a sort of small, underground room, the walls made of earth and stone, and the floor much the same, though his relief quickly faded when he realized he was not alone.

Like most of the seasonal spirits, the Lady of Spring was known by a myriad of different titles, but to Bunny she had always been Willow, the name by which she had chosen to introduce herself at their first meeting all those years ago. Whilst it was Bunny's task to introduce Spring to the parts of the world where Easter coincided with the season of new life and bring Hope with him as he went, Willow was charged with watching over the season in its entirety, and took a great amount of pride in her work. That pride had long since led to a sort of personal vanity that went well beyond the reasonable, and whatever friends Willow might once have had amongst the spirit world had begun to avoid her as surely as they had once sought her out. Bunny's amicable acquaintance with the Spirit of Spring had lasted longer than most, but it had ended with a fair amount of dramatic flair in a violently heated argument over Jack Frost.

It was no surprise, therefore, when Bunny's sudden appearance was greeted with nothing but a dark scowl, even without his knowledge of what Pitch had done without the Guardians even realizing.

"E. Aster Bunnymund," Willow stated flatly, her vibrant green eyes sparking with obvious hostility. "By what right do you dare tread this ground again?"

Straightening, Bunny returned the svelte spirit's stare with a glare of his own. "It's nice to see you too, Will."

"Will?" Placing a hand on her hip Willow tossed her head, sending flowing golden locks bouncing, a rainbow of coloured flowers flashing in and out between the separate strands. Bunny scowled at that, trying to find the same signs of decay in her appearance as he had seen in the Grove, but there were none. Now that he thought about it, the territory of Spring had not looked as badly off as the others either, though what that meant he didn't quite dare guess. Not yet. "Are we such close friends that I would allow you to address me as such? Or have you forgotten that you threw me over for a winter _spritelet_."

"You're the one who pushed the issue, not _me_," Bunny remarked sharply, though, truth be told, if Willow hadn't put her foot down he probably would have.

"Because _you_ sided with a winter spirit!" the golden haired woman accused harshly. "_You_, the bringer of Spring and Hope! You are supposed to be on _my_ side!"

"There aren't any sides here, Willow," Bunny argued, his impatience with the Lady of Spring growing.

"There most certainly _are_," she rebuffed his attempt to reason with her. "Or have you forgotten Skadi so quickly?"

"Course I haven't," the Easter Guardian retorted.

Forgetting the legendary Snow Queen was all but impossible, considering how she had almost succeeded in turning the Earth into a gigantic ice-cube. She had been an unexpected part of the equation, an ally who had turned against them and thrown her lot in with Pitch instead. The shrewd winter spirit had sided with the Nightmare King in secret, the pair plotting together, and staging a battle that had led the Guardians to exhausting themselves. Before they had had a chance to recover, Skadi had taken up the slack left in the wake of Pitch's umpteenth defeat, and unleashed her devastating winter on the world.

To add insult to injury, the infamous Snow Queen had chosen the beloved sanctuary of Santoff Claussen as the centre point for her storms, and, taken so wholly by surprise, they had been all but powerless to fight back. In the end, it had been the other seasonal spirits more than the Guardians themselves that brought the Ice Queen's schemes grinding to a halt. That had been the first time the Guardians were forced to actually _destroy_ another spirit, and the Snow Queen's actions were a large part of the reason winter spirits were such outsiders in the spirit world. The death of Skadi and the events that had led to it were not an experience Bunny ever wanted to repeat, and certainly not one he was likely to forget.

"But Jack ain't Skadi," he reminded Willow pointedly, shaking himself out of the dark memories into which he had unwittingly stumbled to instead rehash an argument that had already been had more than once. "You can't just hate 'im cause they share a season."

"He is a _child_," Willow pronounced condemningly. "In charge of one of the most dangerous seasons, the most _dangerous _powers within the seasonal spirit world. You'll forgive me if I don't see the difference!"

Exasperated and struggling to keep his temper, because he hadn't even had a chance to ask what he had actually come to ask and insulting Willow beforehand was _not_ going to help, Bunny responded with deliberate precision.

"Did you ever think that maybe that's exactly why Manny chose Jack?" he asked bluntly. "Winter's a bleak, cold time of the year for most people. It's Jack's job to brighten it."

"Why do you defend him so ardently?" Willow demanded bitterly, the look on her face one of betrayal. "You used to _hate_ him."

"I didn't use to hate him," Bunny denied, giving the Lady of Spring a pointed look. "Not like you did…_do_. We weren't friends, but I never hated him."

"And now you are here on his behalf," she shot back venomously, and Bunny frowned.

"How did you know that?" he asked sharply, but Willow simply averted her gaze, refusing to , he stared at the spring spirit in disbelief. "Willow, what did you _do_?"

"What I _had_ to!" Willow cried in response, her haughtier falling away beneath a sort of desperate accusation. "You do not _understand_. You Guardians sit in your safe havens ignoring the rest of us and Pitch is free to attack us when and where he wills! We cannot hide away forever as you do! We have duties to attend to! He took Aur and Mara, I was not letting him take me as well!"

"So you told him about the talismans," Bunny concluded, staring Willow down. "You _betrayed_ your own kind."

"I _saved_ my own kind!" Willow snarled in response, her beautiful face twisted by an ugly sneer. "Aur and Mara are _safe_ because of _me_! Jack Frost is not one of our kind. He never was and he never will be! You'll see that he is just like Skadi, and then you will finally do what is _right_."

"We ain't going to kill Frosty," Bunny told her flatly, finally seeing her intent. "Not a chance."

"He _murdered_ my nymphs!" Willow cried in anguish, grief and fury that had had no outlet for centuries finally finding its release, though its target had done nothing to warrant as much.

There was no reason to be found amongst that tempest.

"Jack didn't touch your nymphs, Will," Bunny said sternly but gently, his anger and impatience fading away beneath the realization of what the Winter War had truly cost Willow. This side of her had been hidden from him for years, and it was only when she discovered Jack's induction as a Guardian that he had even begun to guess at what lay behind her outer mask. "That was Skadi, and I'm sorry you never got the closure you wanted there, but Mara _was_ the only one who could have stopped her. You would have just gotten yourself killed as well." He paused, then, when Willow said nothing, continued, "And you can't blame Jack for what Skadi did. You can't make him pay for a crime he didn't commit. That ain't right, Will, and I think you know that."

"All I know is that no good can come from allowing a winter spirit to roam free," Willow responded icily. "And I will not help you save him."

Before Bunny could say another word the spring spirit whirled in a dazzling flash of green and too many others colours to count, the burrow instantly shaping itself into a tunnel for her, and closing before Bunny had a chance to follow. Cursing all seasonal spirits and their damned protector beneath his breath, Bunny tried to hasten after her by forming his own tunnel, but before he could even fully lift his paw another addressed him.

"You will not cure over two centuries worth of anger, guilt, and grief with a mere few words, my friend. Just as a single season is not enough for a plant to grow. So, too, must peace in the heart be slowly cultivated."

Bunny turned to greet the newcomer, but the warm smile that had been present on his face as he did so faded all too swiftly when his eyes fell upon the Spirit of Autumn. Aur had always been the smallest of her kind, fragile and delicate in appearance, even though there was a certain kind of strength beneath her shy, outer demeanour. Now, however, she looked entirely frail, the leaf-like dress that clad her slim frame brittle, her bronzed face lined with sorrow and pain, and her eyes-one coloured an autumn bronze, the other forest green-dulled. A few tawny, leaf-clad pixies flanked their leader, survivors of the Winter War who had, unlike Willow's nymphs, made it through the devastation of Skadi's winter, but their wings hung limp and ragged now, and they used Aur to keep themselves above the ground more than their own ability for flight.

"Aur…"

He had no need to ask who had done this, for Pitch had given more than enough of an explanation even without the Groundhog's pointed exhibition, and though he had begun he did not have the words to finish. Out of all the seasonal spirits, Aur was probably the only one to have truly held no blame over the Guardians for all that had occurred in the past. Willow had maintained a friendship with Bunny, but it had always been tense, and Mara preferred to avoid them altogether, whilst Aur, who had easily lost as much as either of her sisters, was quietly accepting. He did not know if her kind understanding would extend to cover this oversight, however. The seasonals had been angered by the Guardians failure to stop Pitch, for their role in the death of the one the four sisters called mother, and for the losses three of the four had incurred in fighting one of their own. This time Pitch had not been allied against them with their sister, he had come after them directly, and the Guardians, wound up in their own affairs, had not even _known_.

"I was hoping I would not see you here." Ignoring his clear discomfort, the auburn haired spirit glided forward, taking a seat on the ledge that obligingly formed to bear her weight, and cradling her pixies in her lap. Even seated she looked frail, as if a stiff breeze might rip her to shreds, and Bunny had to shake himself out of his mounting alarm to pay heed to her words. Aur watched him as she spoke, and he was slightly uneasy under that knowing stare, because the autumn spirit was never anything but unfailingly polite even with individuals she hated, and Bunny was never quite sure whether he was being indirectly insulted in some way. "Pitch was able to harm Jackson, I assume?"

Trying to shake off the strangeness of hearing Jack's full name, Bunny gave a curt nod.

"Yeah," he said reluctantly. "He was."

Aur sighed lightly, a soft, slightly chilled breeze winding its way around them. "I had hoped," the autumn spirit said subduedly. "That his rank as a Guardian would offer him the protection that has been sorely needed for so long. Alas, Pitch is more devious than even I imagined."

"So you knew?" Bunny demanded, the unspoken admission behind those words ringing louder in his ears than that which had actually been uttered aloud. "You knew what Pitch was up to and you didn't think to warn us? To warn Jack?"

"Neither Mara nor I were recovered enough to fly," Aur responded steadily, her calm not wavering beneath the accusation. "And Willow was unwilling. We thought Jackson would be safe, under your watchful eye. Clearly we have overestimated the value of your protection."

Bunny was entirely uncertain whether that was meant as a rebuke or not, and merely shifted his weight slightly, uneasy, and hoping for a change of topic.

Inclining her head to the side slightly, Aur added, "Though, perhaps I am being somewhat unfair. Jackson has always been an independent spirit. Perhaps guarding him is not so easy as one might think."

"You say that like you know him well," Bunny noted, somewhat surprised. Jack had never hinted at the fact that he may have been on amicable terms with any of the other seasonal spirits. All Bunny had ever gotten out of him was an incredibly reluctant admission that Willow had been trying to destroy him almost since the day he was reborn.

"Not well," Aur corrected. "Though, not through a lack of trying on my part. But the past is not why you have come. It is the future that troubles you, my Pooka friend, and, in that regard, at least, I believe I may be able to offer counsel."

"You mean you'll actually explain what is going on, rather than snarling at me?" Bunny asked dryly, earning the faintest twitch of an amused smile from the sober seasonal spirit.

"You should not blame Lady Willow for speaking with Pitch," Aur answered serenely. "He frightened her, and she was never a warrior."

Neither was Aur, as Bunny recalled it, but he didn't think it prudent to point that out right now.

"Willow said Pitch captured both you and Mara," he recalled. "Is that true?"

"That is so." Aur inclined her head slightly. "Pitch wished to know of the talismans." Raising her hand, Aur briefly touched the yellow-tourmaline pendant handing about her neck. Intricate leaf patterns were etched into the gemstone, and they glowed with a soft, bronze light the same shade as Aur's eye. There was something off about that glow, however, and when Bunny looked closer he realized that several, deep cracks ran through the gemstone, smaller, healed fissures also visible on the surface. "We did not oblige him."

"I can imagine," Bunny snorted, thinking of the last time he had seen Mara in action. Winter might be considered the most dangerous of seasons, but when the Spirit of Summer unleashed a heatwave people ran for cover just as surely as they did from a blizzard. "How did you escape?"

"Easily," Aur elaborated. "I do not believe Pitch had any intentions of attempting to hold us. He was merely entrapping us for the purpose of studying the nature of our powers. When he found himself in need of more precise knowledge, he sought out Willow."

"And she told him everything he wanted to know," Bunny muttered darkly, in no mood to forgive the Lady of Spring, no matter what her reasons, or lack _of _reason.

"After which he used that knowledge?" Aur quietly sought confirmation, and Bunny was forced to unclench his teeth in order to answer.

"Exactly." He gave a curt nod. "He shattered Jack's staff into over a dozen little pieces and kept one of the shards, which he then burnt."

Aur's eyes flashed with something close to alarm. "He destroyed a talisman?"

"Part of one, and only after having as much fun as possible at our expense…" Bunny did not bother hiding how much he would like to get his hands on Pitch right now, but Aur seemed more troubled by the damaged staff as she raised one hand and covered her lips thoughtfully.

"And Jackson still exists?" she asked, sounding perplexed.

"Yes, of course." Confused himself, Bunny frowned. "I wouldn't be here if he didn't would I?"

Aur's expression did not clear, her face taking on a pensive look as her attention drifted away from the Easter Guardian and towards some inner musings.

"That is troubling," she murmured at last, just when Bunny thought he might explode from impatience. "I have never heard of a talisman being destroyed whilst the spirit to which it is attached still lives."

His blood freezing in his veins, Bunny openly stared at the autumn spirit. "I'm sorry, _what_?"

"We are all intricately connected to the items we bear, Master Bunnymund," Aur explained patiently. "They all possess an emotive significance with us, which is especially important when one considers our powers are tied to our emotions, but for _most _seasonal spirits they also represent our cores. A talisman has two purposes, the first being the containment of our power so that we may release it in a safe manner, and the second that it acts as a protection against any opposing element. It is a secret we guard closely, for to reveal such an easily targeted weakness to the world would be to our great detriment. To damage a talisman harms us, but whilst the pieces still remain we still have a connection to it, no matter how weak, and can repair it given time to heal and energy enough to invest in it. To destroy itrobsus of that connection entirely, and, if a talisman _is_ destroyed, it is only a matter of time before one or the other of the things it is meant to prevent kills us. That is how Mara ended Skadi. She shattered the Ice Queen's amulet and melted the pieces, taking away her resistance to the heat of summer. But Jackson…" Cocking her head to the side, Aur gave Bunny an unreadable look. "Jackson would appear to be something special, or perhaps the talisman has not been broken for long enough for the damage to reach critical levels. Have the other fragments of the staff vanished?"

Desperately shaking off the sense of dread that had settled on his shoulders the moment Aur had mentioned the possibility the damage to the staff was a fatal wound, Bunny signed in the negative. "Nah, they're all still there."

"Then perhaps there is still a chance," Aur concluded. "The item must still be repairable, but I cannot tell you how that might be achieved."

"Great," Bunny groaned, slapping a paw across his eyes and dragging it down his face. "That's fantastic."

"My apologies, Master Bunnymund." Aur shook her head sadly. "Seasonal spirits are not enough cause for concern amongst our peers to often warrant negative attention. We are not used to dealing with damage to ourselves caused by those who see us as a threat."

"It's not your fault, Autumn." Sighing, Bunny inclined his head in a nod of thanks. "You've been more helpful than Willow was, anyway."

"I have no quarrel with Jackson." Aur's smile was somewhat distant as she added, "He enjoys colouring the leaves."

"Wait, wait, wait." Bunny held up a hand. "Are you telling me that Frosty is one of your pixies?"

"You could say as much, I suppose." Aur smiled in amusement. "He appeared lonely, and proved quite adept at the task. I was short on helpers, and welcomed the aid. We have not spoken for some decades now, however. I believe he came to fear me, though I cannot say why."

"You can blame Willow for that," Bunny growled slightly. "This grudge of hers has been going on practically since the day Skadi died."

"Ah." Aur's look was knowing, and sorrowful. "That is unfortunate."

"That's not exactly what I would call it," Bunny mumbled under his breath, before addressing the seasonal spirit directly. "There's nothing else you can think of? Nothing at all?"

"I can tell you only what I know of our nature and limits," Aur answered him steadily. "However much she meant it cruelly, Willow is not wrong. Jackson is not one of us. There are differences that draw a dividing line between him and us, no doubt birthed of our unique origins. I am inclined to think of him as half-seasonal and half-Guardian, with one side compensating for the weaknesses of the other."

"Weaknesses?" Bunny inquired, head cocked slightly to the side.

"Put simply, Master Bunnymund," Aur responded. "Had Pitch done to one of us what he has done to young Jackson, we would have already Faded. To have a talisman torn asunder…it is not an easy thing to endure, let alone survive, and to have a piece of ourselves burned away entirely…" She shuddered, her eyes going dark, before shaking herself out of the trance she had fallen into to add, "Winter would appear to be very resilient."

"Heh, you can say that again." Despite the seriousness of the situation, Bunny found himself smirking at the autumn spirit's words, the smallest hint of pride in his own. "Thank you, Aur, for all your help."

"You are very welcome." The autumn spirit bowed her head slightly. "Give my regards to Jackson, and my best wishes that his staff may be made whole again."

"Yeah." Bunny almost let it lie at that, turning to leave, but Willow's accusation still hung in the air and he could not resist swinging back around. "Aur, Pitch didn't hurt you guys, did he?"

Aur's calm façade faltered slightly then as her gaze dropped, and Bunny thought he saw a sheen of tears in her eyes before her hair fell to hide them from view. When she looked up again, the evidence was gone, but he had seen enough to know there was more truth to what both Pitch and Willow had said than he might have wished.

"He knows who made us," the autumn spirit answered softly. "And I do not think the capability exists inside of him to truly destroy us. We are all that is left of her now. But…he has changed with time, and not for the better. The healing once wrought has been unwrought, and there is a madness in his heart now that was not there before. He harmed us, Bunnymund, and harmed us grievously, but we live yet, and shall heal given time."

"I'm sorry." It seemed insufficient. Like tacking a band aid on a gaping wound, but he had nothing more to offer.

"We are all sorry for something, my friend," Aur whispered the words as a soft breath of wind. "I fear we always will be."

* * *

Toothiana had been the only female member of the Guardians for a long time. It was a role she had become accustomed to, playing the part of sister and peacekeeper between the other three, and that of a stern or kind mother whenever the need arose. She had always known what she needed to be for each of her three compatriots, but Jack was something different, and she was never quite certain whether she needed to be friend, sister, or mother where he was concerned. Inevitably, then, she usually ended up being a strange, cobbled mixture of all three. Over the days following their escape from Pitch's lair, however, she found it was most certainly her motherly self needed to face the daunting task of tending to a very, _very _sick child.

Jack's catatonic state immediately following the burning of the shard had doubtlessly saved him from a considerable amount of trauma, but, just as it had been when Pitch had first shattered the staff, the effects of the damage lingered on well past the initial onset. Jack's fever continued to grow steadily worse despite the united efforts of Tooth and North's Yetis to keep it down, and not even Sandy's constantly applied dreamsand could keep the winter spirit in a state of blissful oblivion for long. Jack was constantly startling awake, his mind aware yet far from lucid as his illness combined with the remnants of whatever darkness Pitch had sown in his mind to leave him trapped in a feverish world of nightmarish realities. Tooth soothed him as best she could, cradling him in her arms and whispering calming words in his ear, but more often than not he was oblivious to her attempts to reach him, still locked away in that dark, black hole along with Pitch and the inner demons the Nightmare King had used to torment him.

The only boon came in the form of North's specially designed cooling sheets, which proved a most effective weapon in the battle to get Jack's fever down. And battle was no exaggeration, for the Guardian of Fun's powers fluctuated dangerously each time he started to consciousness, his lack of lucidity only contributing to his crumbling control. It was a danger to have Jack conscious in his feverish state, and Tooth spent most of her time helping Sandy, who spent exhausting hour after hour at the winter spirit's bedside, battling to keep Jack in a peaceful slumber and not in the delirious grip of a waking nightmare. The pair of them, along with an oddly obliging Phil, took shifts to ease the burden, but with North buried in his library searching for answers amongst the many volumes he had collected over the years and Bunny gone to find the other seasonal spirits it was a heavy workload to split between the three of them.

Needless to say, after a relentless, seeming eternity of what Tooth believed was a cruel form of torture, the Guardian of Memories was straying dangerously close to the end of her tether, and she was almost certain that Sandy was as well. It was difficult for a Guardian to see anyone suffering or in pain and they unable to do anything to truly help, but when it was one of their own-Jack, the youngest member of their team and the child among them-the sense of helplessness within was all the more acute. Tooth wanted-_needed_- to do something, _anything_, and she was terribly afraid that if Jack did not show signs of healing soon she was going to end up committing an act she would deeply regret as soon as the initial wave of anger had passed.

It was right then, as she teetered on the verge of her breaking point, that Jack's fever broke, and she had the immense joy of finally seeing the winter spirit resting peacefully. For a long moment after Phil had triumphantly shown her into the room she simply hovered over his slumbering form, content to watch him sleep, and it was only when the image of his untroubled face was firmly seared into her mind that she reached out across the bed to grasp the hand of a dozing Sandy, unable to control the giddy smile fighting to form.

"We did it, Sandy," she whispered in utter relief. "We did it."


	19. Chapter 18: The Forgotten Past

**A/N: Hey, guys, I'm late again, aren't I? The last couple of weeks have actually been a bit rough for me. I took a pretty nasty fall off my horse recently (no, the spine is NOT supposed to bend that way) so spent a few miserable days with an extremely sore back and an even sorer neck, and JUST when I was starting to feel better I discovered that I probably shouldn't have eaten that homemade cottage cheese that had been sitting in the fridge for two weeks because just because it still SMELT alright didn't mean my stomach wasn't going to object. I'm still feeling off color now, but meh, enough of my whining and...WOWZA? Is that a review count of FOUR HUNDRED AND NINETY FIVE? I think you guys must have gotten lost somewhere along the way, because that is pretty mindblowing. I mean, I know the highest reviewed stories in this archive have over three thousand, but for someone with a record of 40 something almost 500 is, well, pretty amazing.**

**But, then, all the people in this fandom seem to be pretty amazing all around, so I guess I shouldn't be that surprised. Seriously, you guys are awesome, give yourselves a round of applause and try to ignore all the mistakes I've doubtlessly missed in this chapter.**

**Read, review, and enjoy!**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 18**

**-The Forgotten Past-**

Bunny returned to the Pole to find North in a much more settled frame of mind than he had been when the Pooka departed, still buried as far as he could go in the contents of a large tome, but no longer showing the clear signs of agitation that had been unmissable hours before. Hopping across the room to drop heavily into the seat directly across from the big Russian, Bunny spoke blandly.

"I hope you've got good news," he said. "'Cause I got none."

"Good news. Yes, news is very good." Closing the book with the reverence that was far more suited to his nature than the carelessness of before, North set it aside and clasped his hands in his lap. "Jack is sleeping, as are Tooth and Sandy."

"You mean sleeping-sleeping, right?" Bunny sought clarification for that somewhat ambiguous statement.

"Of course! Otherwise would not be good news."

North beamed, either deliberately or accidentally ignoring the fact that, just because the winter spirit was no longer lost in Pitch's lingering shadows, it did not mean they were out of the danger zone yet. Bunny couldn't really blame him for that. Good news seemed a rare thing these days, they all needed to savor it whilst they could.

"Now, come, come," the Christmas Guardian ordered briskly. "Tell us what seasons had to say."

"Well, aside from the fact that she still hates Jack's guts as much as she did _before_ we had our little _talk_, Willow didn't have anything to share," Bunny relayed, ignoring the smug look North sent him at the mention of the 'talk'. North was the only Guardian to know the reason for the breach between himself and Willow, and Bunny meant to keep it that way. "But Aur was there as well, and she was much more willing to help."

"Ah, see, more good news!" Clearly on an optimistic streak, North clapped his hands together. "What is big news, then, Bunny?"

"The big news it that we're extremely lucky that Jack's not dead right now." And that statement, flatly delivered without the slightest waver, was as effective a downer as Bunny had ever seen. North _visibly_ deflated, and Bunny's quick eyes did not miss the barely perceptible flash of fear that passed through the Guardian of Wonder's eyes.

"Not dead?" he repeated with dread hanging heavily from each word. "Explain, Bunny!"

"The items," Bunny obliged. "According to Aur, destroying a piece of a seasonal spirit's item is as close as an equivalent to killing them as you can get without actually, you know, killing them. That's how Mara finished off Skadi, and perhaps how Pitch intended to destroy Jack."

"Pitch never intended to kill Jack." North shook his head. "He wanted ally again, like Skadi, and when Jack no come willingly, Pitch force."

"But how did he know burning that fragment wouldn't kill the brat?" Bunny demanded. "Even Aur seemed surprised, though she did say something about Jack not being a proper seasonal."

"She is right," North confirmed without hesitation. "Jack was chosen by Man in Moon. He is Guardian, and was Guardian even before named as such. Maybe once staff was source of power, but Jack has believers now, they help keep him safe."

"So you're saying he gets power from both?" Bunny speculated, frowning. The idea made sense, and was as good a theory as any as to why Jack was not already Fading on them, and if belief was what was keeping Jack alive… "Do you think maybe that's the answer?"

"What is answer?" North hadn't followed his line of thought.

"Jack's believers," Bunny supplied, his excitement growing. "Maybe we can wean him off the staff so he's more like us. Dependent on belief for his power."

"But staff does not _give_ power," North reminded him, effectively shattering his hopes. "It constrains it, remember?"

"Right, right." Bunny nodded glumly. "And belief does the opposite, which means even if it _is_ helping keep Jack alive right now it's actually making things worse in the long run. It all comes back to the staff, really, doesn't it? Yet, without that one piece, we can't fix the bloody thing. And, if we can't _fix_ it…."

He let his words trail away, knowing no more needed to be said. They all understood the stakes here.

"We must wait till Tooth and Sandy awaken," North declared at last, throwing his weight back into his chair. "Then we can decide what to do next." Turning at the sound of the door creaking open, he half-rose from his seat the moment he saw who was present. "Phil? Something is wrong?"

Immediately going taut, Bunny listened anxiously to Phil's response, relaxing the instant the Yeti conveyed that the only problem was the fact that Jack was now very much awake, and had apparently vacated his room in favor of another part of the Pole.

"Heh, doesn't stay down for long, does he?" he chuckled lightly, trying not to let the relief flooding through him go to his head as he rose. "I'll go talk to 'im…."

"Actually," North interceded, placing himself between Bunny and the door. "Is my turn, I believe, for talk."

"Your _turn_?" Bunny blinked, honestly taken-aback. "He's not some toy the ankle-biters are fighting over, North."

"No, that he is not," North agreed without hesitation. "Fact remains it is still my turn. Talking is needed, if my talking does not work, you may try next."

"Fine." Reluctantly conceding, Bunny moved to sit back down again, giving North a warning glance as the big man prepared to leave the room. "But if you break 'im, you got to fix 'im too."

* * *

Heeding the warning Phil had threaded in with his good news, North stepped into the tower room with a careful tread, but, even with that precaution, he very nearly ended up on his rump as the soles of his boots failed to find purchase on a floor that was slick with ice. Grabbing a hold of the door to keep his balance, he let his gaze wander over the beautiful fern patterns decorating the ground beneath him, still able to appreciate the intricate elegance of their design under the present circumstances. Eventually, however, his eyes were drawn to the hooded, huddled figure folded into the corner of the window seat, and the reason Phil had summoned him.

Jack was turned away from him, his legs curled beneath his thin frame and his forehead pressed against the glass, one finger drawing childish images in the frost his touch formed across the pane. North couldn't see his face, but the decided slump to the teenage immortal's shoulder was warning enough as to his frame of mind. Bracing himself for a conversation that was certainly not going to be easy, North approached Jack, propping himself on the edge of the seat as he spoke gently.

"You should be getting some rest."

"I couldn't sleep," came the soft response, his conversation partner not bothering to lift his head, tired blue eyes staring unseeingly out the window.

"Ah." North nodded understandingly. "You want me to find Sandy?"

"No. Not really."

Letting the matter drop willingly, North fell silent for several moments, gathering his thoughts as he pondered the best way to approach the subject he had in mind. Jack was notoriously difficult to engage in a serious discussion, either deflecting, insulting, or simply clamming up when pressed. North and the others had adopted a hunter's method of outwaiting their prey where the winter spirit was concerned in the hopes that the many unresolved matters that still lay between them would eventually be laid to rest. That hadn't happened yet, however, and North was beginning to think it never would.

Not without prompting.

"If you are not sleeping," he said aloud. "We can talk, yes?"

Jack lifted his head slightly, his blue eyes shadowed by his hood, but the wariness that was always present-and how _wrong _was it that _any_ child, immortal or not, should be wary of a _Guardian?_-was as clear to see as day.

"You shouldn't even be in here," the younger Guardian answered, his shoulders dropping ever so slightly more, the exhausted line of his posture matching the drawn look on his face. "This room will be freezing before long."

"Ach." North dismissed his words with a short wave of one hand, ignoring the chill that had already set in. "I live in North Pole, Jack. You think a little cold bothers me?"

"I guess not," the winter spirit conceded noncommittally, inclining his head ever so slightly, before turning back to his former position. With his attempt to send North away foiled, it was only a matter of time before Jack caved, though the Christmas Guardian was not entirely prepared for the question that was thrown his way. "Are you angry with me?"

"Angry?" He started in surprise, noted the way Jack flinched at his tone, mistaking shock for irritation, and immediately softened it. "Why would I be angry?"

The winter spirit folded himself further into the corner, and North could see the lingering remnants of whatever nightmares had been haunting his sleep in the shadows reflected in the normally bright, blue depths of the youngest Guardian's eyes.

"I should have waited," he admitted at last in little more than whisper. "I shouldn't have chased after that Nightmare by myself. Maybe if I hadn't…" He let the words trail away, and North could only guess at what he might have been thinking of in that moment.

"There were children in danger," North reminded him gently. "You did what any Guardian would have."

"They wouldn't have even been in danger if it weren't for me!" Jack retorted instantly, wrapping his fingers about his upper arms. "I _put_ them there. He only went after them because of me."

"That sounds like something Pitch would say," North discerned, still treading lightly, knowing full well the impact Pitch's worst illusions could have on his victims. "It was Pitch who took kids, Jack, not you. He made choice, not you. You saved them."

"Really?" Jack shot him a humorless smile. "Because that isn't what I _remember_. That's not what I _see_ every time I close my eyes. That's not…" He stopped himself, shaking his head as if to try and dislodge the image. "It was so _real_…"

"Do you want to see them?" North asked on impulse, realizing that perhaps the only way to convince Jack what he had seen was indeed an illusion was to present the proof otherwise. For a moment he thought the winter spirit was going to say yes, a spark that had been missing from his gaze lighting briefly, before extinguishing with almost as much speed.

"No," Jack declined his offer. "I can't. Not while I'm still…still like _this_."

North nodded slowly, understanding that reason well enough, but did not speak, letting the silence linger, because Jack had not answered his prior question honestly. There had been a reason the winter spirit thought he would be angry, but it was not the one the boy had offered him. Despite North's persistent silence, however, Jack did not speak again, remaining curled into the corner with his head bowed and his arms wrapped about himself. Relenting at last, North decided to try a different approach.

"The children are safe," he felt the need to reaffirm that, and provided details to support his claims. "Tooth took them home. They are in trouble with their mother for wandering off, but fine."

It had been the right thing to say, the Christmas Guardian observed, as a fair bit of the tension in Jack's body drained away, and North caught sight of blue eyes that were suspiciously bright before Jack withdrew into the shadow of his hood. That dissipation of tension seemed a meaningless victory, however, when his next words were bound to bring it right back.

He continued reluctantly, "How much of what Pitch said was true?"

"About my staff?" Jack glanced at him in confusion. "All of it, I guess. The evidence certainly seems to be on his side."

"No, not about staff," North corrected. "What Pitch said about _us_."

Jack was looking at him as he asked the question, and thus North was free to observe the way the young Guardian simply shut down, every defense mechanism three hundred years of neglect had given him suddenly put into play. It was extremely disconcerting to watch a face normally so freely expressive turn to impassive stone, though North knew it was not a façade Jack could maintain for long. The boy showed his emotions too freely for indifference in abundance to ever be believable.

"Pitch didn't say anything about you," Jack said curtly, outright denying he had been aware of what was going on through the latter part of the Guardian's confrontation with their nemesis.

"He did." North waved away the denial. "And not all he said was wrong. We all owe apologies that have never been given."

"You don't have to apologize," Jack murmured, dismissing North's words without even taking the time to consider them. "I…I know I'm not easy to put up with, and I put you guys through a lot of trouble, so I _understand _why..."

"Jack," North cut him off before he could go any further. "Before I became Guardian, I was bandit. I robbed from richest people in land, and caused much trouble for many people."

"_You_?" Jack stared at him, and North felt a smug sense of victory at seeing that shock had banished both reserve and hesitation. "You were a…a _thief_?"

"Very _good_ thief," he announced proudly. "Stole from many people thinking they were smarter than me. You see, Jack, one cannot have naughty list unless one first knows what naughty _is_. I know trouble well, and you?" He shook his head. "You not trouble, Jack."

He knew he had lost the winter spirit before the response even came, and cursed himself for bringing the conversation back around to the initial topic so swiftly.

"Don't try to tell me you don't have more important things to be doing," Jack stated warningly. "I know it's not true."

"Do I have _better_ things to be doing?" North countered. "Yes. Very many better things. But more important? I can think of nothing."

He let Jack mull over those words for a while, knowing a thorough examination would be necessary before the winter spirit decided to take them at face value or not. North had come to realize, after a series of trial and error conversations, that anything the Guardians did or said now was still being weighed against the three hundred years of neglect that had preceded the present. Even after the months of effort they had put in since Pitch's defeat, there was still something lacking in the bond between them, a faltering trust that was _present_, but not yet solid enough to carry them through without hiccup. This was not the way he would have wished to reaffirm Jack's faith in them, but he refused to let it be reason for that faith to dwindle.

"You _wouldn't _have noticed, you know," Jack said at last, something like resignation in his voice as he picked idly at a loose thread on his sleeve, his words proving that, no matter _how_ out of it he had been at the time, he had still absorbed Pitch's venom, even if only on a subconscious level. "Pitch was right about that. If I had disappeared a few months ago, you wouldn't even have blinked an eye."

"What do you want me to say?" North asked softly in response. "Is true. No denying it. But we try better now, no?"

Again Jack hesitated, and North waited, realizing what a long time it had been since he had been so deathly afraid of the answer yet to emerge from a child's mouth. No one but Katherine had ever held that power over him, and he had _let_ no one hold it since the Guardians lost those among them who could yet still be called children. The absence of youth in their ranks had been a hole that had gone unfilled for centuries, and North was somewhat taken aback to realize that void was slowly being filled once more. It was a simultaneously painful yet joyful thought, and he filed it away for examination at a later date.

"Jack?" he questioned aloud, having waited to the limit of his patience.

"You came for me," Jack said at last, staring at his hands, folded together atop his knees. "Twice. I wasn't sure if you would, but you did, so I guess that means I owe you some answers."

"No," North answered flatly, earning a surprised glance from his conversation partner. "No 'owing', Jack. You tell me what is on mind only if you _want_ to, no because you think you _have_ to. There is no 'owing'. We came because we wanted to."

Jack stared at him for a long moment, measuring him, turning the next set of words in this ongoing struggle over and over in his mind. North held the winter spirit's gaze for the duration of the boy's silence, and felt a small sense of triumph when the new quiet did not last as long as that which had preceded it.

"Can I…" Jack hesitated, then forged onwards. "Can I ask you something, then?"

"Of course." North nodded, offering the boy an encouraging nod that was largely wasted, for Jack would only have seen it out of the corner of his eye, the winter spirit's direct gaze averted out the window.

"I thought Pitch would say yes," Jack said at last, taking North by surprise. "I honestly thought he'd take that chance." Turning back to the Christmas Guardian, Jack met his gaze squarely, though his words were uncertain as he asked, "Why didn't he?"

And _that_, North mused, was a question that would require a lengthy answer. Before he delved into that sordid history, however, he felt a need to satisfy his own curiosity.

"I will answer," he said. "But is long story. I wish to ask question first." He paused, waiting for the barely perceptible nod of permission Jack offered, then inquired, "Why did you pause, Jack?" The winter spirit stiffened, but deciding an answer-a _true_ answer, because _this _was the real reason Jack had expected him to be angry, he was sure-was worth the risk of losing what small progress he had made, North did not stop. "Why did you make Pitch that offer, after everything he has done?"

"It's hard to explain."

Lowering both hands and eyes, Jack twisted his fingers together in agitation. North observed the gesture for a moment, before reaching out with his own hand and closing it around both of Jack's own, stilling them. The newest Guardian jumped slightly at the touch, and tried to pull away, but North ignored both the withdrawal and the distinct chill radiating off the winter spirit's skin, keeping his much larger hand in place over the two smaller appendages.

"Then explain to me, Jack," he said gently. "Please."

Swallowing convulsively, Jack shook his head, and North could not help but think how very, _very_ tired Jack must be of hiding himself from those whom he called his friends. The winter spirit never dared to bare himself to them in more than the most marginal of degrees at a time, because he was so scared, petrified even, that they would see something that repulsed them, and he would lose this. Lose what was now _everything_ to him. It was another misstep on the part of the Guardians that they had not driven that fear back into the furthest corners of their young comrade's mind, but North hoped he could allay those fears at least a little now.

"Jack." With a gentle, almost paternal touch, North reached out with one finger, placing it beneath the teenage immortal's chin as he raised Jack's downcast head so that their eyes met. "I need you to listen to me carefully; We are _not_ going to abandon you. No matter what happens. No matter what you say or do, we will _always_ be here. We need you to know that, Jack. We need you to understand that there is _nothing_ that _you_ are capable of that would make us push you away."

"How can you be so sure?" Jack whispered hoarsely, and North could clearly see how broken their cheerful winter spirit was on the inside. How jagged and sharp the pieces of his tattered spirit were beneath that quick-fire smile and quicksilver tongue. How little Jack truly understood what he had now. When experiencing it for the first time himself, North had not understood what _family _meant either, but he had learned, and Jack would learn too, given time. Time Pitch was trying to steal away from them.

There was a wistful note North could not quite banish from his voice when he next spoke. A deep rooted sadness that bespoke of past tragedies forever engraved on the heart.

"Because, Jack," he replied. "There is nothing one will not do to protect family, even if you have to protect them from themselves."

Jack swallowed sharply, his eyes again brightened by a wet sheen, but when he spoke his voice was steady, with only the barest hint of a tremor contained in its sound. "I-I made that offer," he began hesitantly. "I offered him that choice because it was what I would have wanted someone to offer me, if I was in his position."

North frowned slightly, troubled by those implications. "Jack, you could never..."

He was not quite prepared for the explosion those words evoked.

"Don't tell me that I never would have done what he has!" Jack cut him off forcefully, tearing his hands away and going so far to stand, his thin form silhouetted by the white wonderland that lay outside the window. It was a stark contrast to the dark mood now invading the room, Jack trapped between them both. "Because I _could_ have, North! It would have been so easy to hate you guys, to be angry and bitter and everything he is. I could have _been_ Pitch."

North laughed. A full, deep laugh that shook his entire frame. Jack looked at first affronted then bewildered, his expression showing such a range of emotions North had trouble identifying most, let alone naming them.

"No, Jack," he said at last, once had control of himself again. "You could not have." He waited until Jack hesitantly retook his seat, before reaching out and pointing a large finger at the Guardian of Fun's chest. "Because of _this_, Jack."

Confused, the winter spirit stared at him. "My center?"

"No, your _heart_," North emphasized. "This kind heart that forgave us, made room for us when we had no right to ask. Because even when no one could see you, you still cared enough to make children smile. Because we _all_ have black stains inside we wish we could be rid of, but, like us, you don't let them _rule_ you. You could not have been Pitch, Jack, because Pitch has forgotten what it means to love children. To love friends. To love _family_. You remember. You care. You are _Guardian_."

Jack stared at him, wholly disarmed, and North could not help but smile at the open wonder on the winter spirit's face.

"You really believe…" Jack paused, struggling to verbalize his thoughts. "You truly think I would never…?"

"I believe," North stated solemnly. "And so should you. You had three hundred years to become like Pitch, Jack. Three hundred years alone. Did you?"

Jack shook his head.

North spoke again.

"Then will not happen," he concluded. "If three hundred years did not cause it to be so, I hope Guardians will not!"

"I don't know," Jack deadpanned, and North inwardly danced with glee at seeing even that small spark of mischief return to the winter spirit's eyes. "You guys can be pretty terrible sometimes."

"Ha! Terrible! Very funny!" He held up a stern, warning finger. "Naughty list is still open, Jack. Be very careful."

"Cross my heart." The Guardian of Fun made the appropriate movements with his hands, but as soon as he stilled the levity of that brief moment drained away, and the soberness that had swamped their conversation since it began seeped back in. "What about Pitch? Why did he refuse?"

"Well, mostly it's because he's a good-for-nothing snake who couldn't see a good thing if it smacked him right in the middle of his honker," Bunny's interjection came before North could even consider his answer, and the Guardian of Wonder threw his fellow spirit a slight frown, which Bunny ignored completely, his entire focus on not losing his footing as he all but tiptoed across the floor. "But that's the short version, and I'm guessing you want the full blown tale."

Jack didn't answer immediately, and North had the strangest feeling that some sort of silent communication was going on between the pair as they stared one another down. Bunny was the only one to have witnessed all that had occurred in Pitch's lair, and whatever had happened had left its mark. On _both_ of them.

"How're you doin', Frosty?" Bunny inquired at last, breaking the silence. "You done scaring us all to death?"

"I'm fine," Jack lied easily. "I'm pretty sure this isn't an instant death scenario."

Bunny made an odd choking noise. "You're _joking_ about this?"

"What would you prefer I do?" Jack asked him, suddenly sounding exhausted. _Beaten_. "Cry?"

This time Bunny snorted, shaking his head. "I've had more than enough of that, thanks."

"Are you sure?" Jack smirked. "I'm sure we could find some eggnog if we tried really hard."

Startled by that statement, North threw the Easter Guardian a suspicious glance, in reply to which Bunny simply shrugged innocently, the value of the gesture reduced somewhat by the barely masked grin that adorned the Pooka's face. Frowning, but deciding the matter could lie for the time being, he shifted over slightly to allow Bunny a seat in the alcove, noting absently that the window seat was the only part of the room not sporting an icy decoration. Jack still had some measure of control over his powers, then, though how long that would last North doubted any of them knew.

"So…Pitch?" Jack prompted, once Bunny was settled.

It took the Russian man a moment to gather his thoughts, to decide the best place to start, and eventually he chose a point seemingly at random, though he trusted that his instincts were guiding him without him even knowing it.

"Tooth told you once that we were all someone before we were chosen," he began. "And that was true. But is also true that we four all became Guardians before…well, before we _died_."

"What?" Jack looked at him in surprise.

Having expected as much, North simply continued.

"Back when Guardians first existed, things were different. Was not like modern times. People, even adults, still believed in magic and wizards and all sorts of wonderful things. We, the Big Four, and several others were each chosen by Man in Moon to fight Pitch, even though, at time, not one of us were spirits. I was first, along with a wizard named Ombric, a young girl called K-Katherine." Even after all these years he still stumbled over her name. Hoping Bunny had not noticed, North finished, "And Man in the Moon's old guardian and playmate, Nightlight."

He trailed off then, and there was something _knowing_, something altogether too understanding in the way Jack asked softly, "What happened to them?"

North's mind was traveling back to a place he had all but ignored for what seemed like eons now, and he struggled to find the words to describe the Dark Age none of them had truly seen coming. It had been a fight that had come so close to taking everything from them, and that _had_ cost them several dear friends.

"Pitch happened." Bunny's interruption was not entirely unexpected, and North happily allowed the Easter Guardian to take the lead. "In all his gruesome glory."

"There were many battles," North picked up where Bunny had left off. "Sometimes we won, and sometimes Pitch did. He was a lot stronger then. He didn't have the Nightmares like now, but rather his own Fearlings, _true _Fearlings, and they were so much more frightening. So much more dangerous. We had our own advantages as well, though, and the fight might have gone on indefinitely had Pitch not found himself a willing ally in Skadi, the Ice Queen." Giving Jack a meaningful glance, he added, "Your predecessor. Together, the pair of them plotted to bury the world in bleak and terrible ice age, and we knew, then, that we had to stop Pitch once and for all. But disagreement came on the method to be used. Some of us wanted to destroy Pitch for good, and some, like you tried, wanted to attempt to redeem him. To bring back the hero he once was."

"Hero?" Jack queried, and North exchanged a glance with Bunny.

"We forget you don't know these things, Frosty," Bunny stated, half apologetically. "Perhaps it would be best if we went right back to the start of the tale, when Kozmotis Pitchiner first became the King of Nightmares…"


	20. Chapter 19: A Tale Untold

**A/N: What is an update schedule again? I've forgotten. XD**

**Okeydokey, so some of you (who have read the books) will likely find this chapter a little boring, as its rehashing things you'll most likely already know. It is also dialogue filled, and quite possibly also filled with mistakes as it is 12:11 AM here right now and I'm half sleep typing. This is more of an interim than an actual chapter regardless, and a slight information dump, but hopefully, once we get past this, I can move on with the plot without confusing anyone (more than I already have, at least).  
**

**Thank you for all your continuing reviews and support, though I have replied to none of the latest yet I promise to do so as soon as I have time. Out of review replies and another chapter, I assumed you guys would prefer the latter. :-)**

**Read, review, and enjoy!**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**P.S TO MADDIE SETH: As hinted by the author's note above, I have read the books. The material in this chapter is probably fifty-fifty book to my head canonnining.**

**P.P.S Also, I know Pitch's daughter's name has yet to be confirmed and that it's not really Seraphina. I needed a name and it was handy. If we ever hear what it really is, I will change it.**

**CHAPTER 19**

**-A Tale Untold-**

"Pitch was born in a time in our history known as the Golden Age. It's not something many people remember, because nobody on this particular planet has ever traveled far enough to know what might exist outside it, but that does not change the fact that it _did_ occur. In those times, the Universe was governed by Constellations, who each had their own form of royalty, though the greatest among those were Tsar and Tsarina Lunanoff…you following me Frosty?"

Bunny had not failed to notice the slightly glazed look of his audience, and, whilst such discussions among the Big Four would not have stretched the imagination of any of their number, Bunny had learnt some time ago that his own perception of the Universe was oftentimes at variance with those of a more human ilk. Whilst he had once walked time and space, most of the other Guardians, save Sandy alone, had been earth-bound all their lives, and hearing all about the ruling Constellations and a Golden Age well beyond the Earth's boundaries tended to alter one's perspective a tad.

"Yeah, I got it." Jack nodded regardless, a hint of droll mirth in his voice as he recounted, "Big important families, ruling over kingdoms in space, that were apparently fairly well off if they lived in a Golden Age. Check, check, and check. So, what went wrong?"

"Just because it was a Golden Age didn't meant everything was all sweet and rosy," Bunny warned, waving a paw slightly. "As a matter of fact, the Seas of Space that lay between the Constellations were practically crawling with villainous baddies. Dream Pirates, Nightmare Men, Fearlings…believe me, Jack, if you'd seen any of them at their full strength…well, let's just say they make Pitch look like an amateur. At the time, however, he was anything but. General Kozmotis Pitchiner was the man chosen by Tsar and Tsarina Lunanoff along with the other ruling families to hunt down and capture every last one of the outlaws threatening their peaceful realms, and Pitch did it. He rooted out every last shred of evil found to exist and enclosed them all in a specially constructed prison, designed for just such a purpose. He even went so far as to volunteer to guard the only way in or out of that dark hole, acting as the sole guard to a black hole filled with villainy. The Lunanoffs and other ruling families accepted his offer, and that was their first mistake. The one that would lead their Golden Age to becoming one of utter ruin."

He paused briefly, then, trying to gather his thoughts and remain focused on the only topic that truly mattered. It was not easy, for, if Katherine's death still pained North, the eradication of his own people at the hands of one who had once been such an image of strength and nobility was no less a burden to bear. Pitch's descent into wickedness had been utter and complete, and he had taken whole _worlds _with him as he fell.

"In some ways those rulings families were also to blame," he continued after a lengthy silence, grateful for the fact neither member of his audience had chosen to interrupt. North had heard this tale before, and understood the personal impact it had had on Bunnymund, whilst Jack tended to be more aware of other people's feelings than he often let on. Or he just didn't want to interrupt the story, Bunny couldn't really be sure. "Because Pitch was not just a soldier and a hero to be wielded as both sword and shield against their enemies, he was also a _father_ with a daughter who loved him, and the Constellations _knew _that. They knew Pitch had a daughter. They knew such a task would keep him from her. They _must_ have known what a temptation that would be, because the Fearlings certainly did. They preyed relentlessly on Pitch's desire to see his little girl once more, and, though he resisted them for years, his fall was, perhaps, inevitable. One day they tricked him into opening the door to their prison, and in that moment the Fearlings overwhelmed him, and the great man who had been known throughout the Universe for his valor and heroism was lost to a shadow too great for any being to resist. General Kozmotis Pitchiner became Pitch Black, the Golden Age ended, and the Era of Nightmares began.

"Pitch's fall preceded that of whole worlds by only a little, because as soon as the Fearlings had him firmly in their grasp they set about using him as their sole instrument of revenge upon those who had sought to entrap them. Whole planets and the stars that burned alongside them were extinguished by his shadows, and the dreams of all children slowly withered and died beneath the onslaught of the terrible nightmares Pitch brought bearing down upon them. For some, however, a fate worse than to simply live in fear was conjured, and Pitch bolstered the ranks of his Fearling Army with those children who had been most pure of heart, full of hope and wonder and dreams. But, even as he slowly consumed all that had once made the Golden Age the wholesome and beautiful thing it had been, Pitch held his greatest desire in check, leaving those he most wished vengeance upon until the very last

"The Lunanoffs had seen what was coming, however. With the very Universe falling apart around them, it was all but impossible not to. In an effort to save their son, Prince Lunar, for whom Pitch had devised a most terrible fate, the Lunanoffs fled their home aboard a vessel of their own construction; the Moon Clipper, whose path of flight would eventually lead them to Earth. There they hoped to hide from Pitch, disguised as a simple moon orbiting the little known world, but Pitch had followed them too closely, and attacked before they even had a chance to conceal themselves.

"A great battle was waged in a desperate effort to protect the Prince, and many lives were lost. Pitch would not triumph, however, not that day, for the Prince's guardian and playmate, a spectral being named Nightlight, sacrificed his own freedom in order to pierce Pitch's black heart with a dagger made purely of light. The weapon immobilized the Nightmare King, and both Pitch and Nightlight vanished in a blinding flash, their fates then unknown. Tsar and Tsarina Lunanoff had both perished in the battle, leaving the young Prince orphaned, with only the few crewmembers of the crippled Moon Clipper left to act as his companions. It is small wonder, then, that he turned his attention to the inhabitants of the Earth, drawing comfort from their nearby presence, even if they knew nothing of him at all. Pitch's reign seemed ended and the Universe settled once more, but Tsar Lunar remained ever watchful, knowing it was likely only a matter of time before Pitch returned, bringing his darkness with him."

"And he was right, wasn't he?" Jack stated quietly, his knees drawn up to his chest and his chin resting on the arms folded atop them as he watched Bunny with rapt attention. His blue eyes were somber, without the spark that should have inhabited their crystalline depths, but the bone-deep sadness of before was absent, driven away by North's earlier words and the distraction the Easter Guardian's storytelling was providing. "Manny was right, and Pitch did come back."

"How did you know the prince was Manny?" Bunny asked, more to stall for time than anything else. There was a reason the Guardians did not often speak of the past, and it was not simply because they had forgotten it.

"How many other people do you know who live on a moon?" Jack shot him a sideways glance, and Bunny was forced to concede that was an entirely valid point. Whilst he had once known others, Manny was indeed the only being he now knew to inhabit a moon, hence the singularity of his title. "How did he come back?"

"By accident, naturally." Bunny grimaced. "A moonbeam searching the Earth for any trace of him found both him and Nightlight in a deep cave leeching darkness. The moonbeam was absorbed into Nightlight's dagger, and in the process somehow managed to wake them both. Pitch was freed, as was Nightlight, but, whilst the former recalled all that had passed prior to his imprisonment, Nightlight was without those memories, the sacrifice he had made in order to keep Pitch sealed for so long. He knew little beyond the fact that the Nightmares were evil, and that his light dispelled them. Manny couldn't rely on Nightlight to stop Pitch a second time, so he sought other methods, which just so happened to be us."

"You mean the Guardians?" Jack sought clarification, his eyes darting briefly to the door, which opened to admit Tooth and Sandy, before they were drawn back to Bunny's face.

"Not exactly," he replied, waiting to see if the only one of the newcomers able to would interrupt him, then proceeding when Toothiana held her peace. "Back then we weren't ready to become Guardians. We were a group of individuals with the capability of _becoming_ something more, but too wound up in our own business to know any better. It was Manny who chose to push us all together, and the place he selected to begin it all was Santoff Claussen, a village governed by the wizard Ombric, a survivor of the lost city of Atlantis." Jack's expression was growing a little overwhelmed again, so Bunny turned the conversation away from lost cities and back to the central thread of the story he was weaving. "Santoff Claussen was a place like no other on Earth, guarded by magic and filled with it too, so it wasn't really any wonder Pitch sought it out as one of his first targets."

"Ha!" North interrupted with a sharp bark of laughter. "He could not chew what he had bitten off! No Nightmare is match for Bandit King!"

"As you may have guessed," Bunny added wryly. "It was at that point that North entered the picture. He fought off Pitch's assault and, once he was done arguing with himself over whether he was some rogue bandit or the softhearted buffoon with major ego issues we all know he _really _is, he settled down in Santoff Claussen and became Ombric's apprentice. Together, Ombric, North, a young orphan girl named Katherine, and Nightlight would ward off Pitch's first attempt to conquer the Earth, beating him into submission with the help of the Yetis of the Himalayas and the Lunar Llamas, who were…well, I'll explain that some other time. The important thing to note is that Pitch was beaten, and Manny named the four individuals largely responsible for that victory as Guardians of Childhood. That's how it all began."

"But was long way between beginning and ending," North supplied when Bunny fell silent. "Many battles were fought, and new comrades were found. Bunny, Tooth, and then Sandy became Guardians also, and others lent us their aid when we had need of it. We soon found, however, that Pitch was not an enemy that could truly be defeated. At least, not through fighting."

"It was Katherine's idea," Tooth offered softly, joining in the telling. "That Pitch could be redeemed. Pitch captured her at one time, and something happened between them…something that made her believe he could be saved, and the key to doing so lay in his daughter."

"You mean she was still alive?" Jack started in surprise. "Even after all that Universe wrecking Pitch did?"

"She was still alive," Bunny confirmed with an incline of his head. "She somehow managed to escape what a great many others didn't, and eventually found her way to Earth, where she became the entity most would come to know as Mother Nature."

"Her real name was Seraphina," said Tooth. "She was a strange, wandering soul, an enigma to many, but to us she was our one hope of redeeming Pitch. She was the only person in the Universe he cared about deeply enough to fight the Fearlings. We thought that, with her aid, we could perhaps cure Pitch and restore him to the man-the _hero_-he had once been. But…" she trailed off, looking aggrieved.

"But that was before Seraphina died," Bunny finished for her, instantly earning Jack's undivided attention.

"She _died_?"

"Yes," North again took the lead. "We do not know exactly how it occurred. She was never one to pick sides and would often favor one side one moment and another the next. Yet, even though she often directly interfered, she did not place herself in way of harm. The battle that changed it all was different. Seraphina made a mistake. To this day we do not know whether it was Pitch or one of us that dealt fatal blow, but Seraphina was mortally wounded in conflict, and she did not survive."

"She left four successors behind to fill her shoes," Tooth explained. "The seasonals, who took up her most important duties of governing the seasons. For a brief time we hoped they would be enough to keep Pitch at bay, but they were but pieces of their former mistress, and they held no sway over her father. Whilst he had acted with reason up until that point, Pitch gave into the Fearlings' madness entirely in the wake of his daughter's death, and led us into a battle that would prove to be our last."

"We were ready to destroy him then and there, once and for all," North recalled. "He was danger to all, out of control, and we could see no other way. But Katherine...Katherine still believed the old Kozmotis Pitchiner could be restored, though to this day I do not understand why she tried so hard to save him. They had bond of sorts, founded on something we never understood, and she refused to give up in him no matter how much we argued with her."

Bunny grunted slightly at that. "I sometimes wonder if she would have managed it," he spoke his thoughts aloud. "Had circumstances not aligned themselves to be so completely against us, I still believe she could have brought him back eventually. I guess we'll never know either way, because what happened next robbed her of the chance."

"For next part of story it is important to remember four seasonals were not a creation of Man in Moon," North spoke slowly. "They were Mother Nature's children, all born from a separate part of their mistress. Aur was kindness, calm, and compassion. Willow was charm, vanity, and pride. Mara was passion, temper, and charisma. And Skadi...Skadi was cruelty, hatred, and arrogance. Pitch knew that, and he chose his ally well, something we would live to regret for some time."

"Skadi was all too willing to unite with Pitch to work against us," Tooth said bitterly. "She blamed us for Seraphina's demise to a greater extent than Pitch ever did, and it was she who conceived a plan to cast the entire world into an eternal winter. Whilst Pitch used his Fearlings to distract and tire us with an all out attack on the Lunar Lamadary, Skadi moved in secret to invade Santoff Claussen, bringing with her all the brutality of an unforgiving winter. We realized what was happening all too late, and Santoff Claussen and those who protected it were lost by the time we were able to return there. The Lamadary had also fallen, and by that point we were exhausted from our struggles, tired and beaten and worn down. Skadi and Pitch chose that moment to unleash their full strength. The Tooth Palace was besieged, and we were overwhelmed. It seemed a certainty that we would lose, and, in that desperate time, desperate measures were considered."

North shook his head, and, though it had been many, _many _years since the events they spoke off, the grief in his voice was still fresh. "In the midst of all the chaos Katherine and Nightlight decided to try negotiations. We did our best to dissuade them, but Katherine was always stubborn and Nightlight...Nightlight would have followed her anywhere, so profound was their bond. Against our better judgment, we allowed them to go."

"It would be the last time we saw either of them," Bunny stated grimly, his own face set as he refused to let the memories take a hold. "Pitch refused Katherine's offer for peace, and the battle waged onwards. We could have easily lost everything that day, had others not come to our aid. Just as it appeared Pitch had won, the other members of the seasonal quartet suddenly joined the fray. Aur and Willow pitted their pixies and nymphs against Skadi's ice sculpture army, whilst Mara and her sylphs headed straight for the source. We, for our part, were forced to keep battling the Fearlings Pitch continued to send against us."

"It seemed to take an age," Tooth murmured in sad recollection. "But Mara eventually overcame her sister season, destroying Skadi and with her the army she had conjured to destroy us. By that point the seasonals could fight no more, having lost the majority of their helpers and most of their own strength, and it fell to us, exhausted as we were, to finish Pitch off. We gave our all in that last battle. We stripped Pitch of his Fearlings so that all he had left to rely on was his own limited powers. We made him weak. We made him powerless. We destroyed him again and again in retribution for his crimes until the only thing keeping him alive were the shadows that possessed him. We beat him, but it came at a terrible cost, for not a single one of us walked away alive. Were it not for Manny, the Guardians would have ceased to exist that day. But the Man in the Moon would not have it. He brought us back, one by one in guises both the same and not, until the Big Four were reunited once more. But all our friends…everyone we lost in the Winter War…they're gone forever, and no amount of belief, hope, wonder, or dreams will ever bring them back."

Silence fell in the wake of that somber pronouncement, all four of the original Guardians wrapped up in their painful memories of the Dark Age Pitch had brought upon them. It was not right to say they had barely survived that period, because they had _not_ survived it at all. None of them should be standing where they were today. They should have all perished, along with those of their friends who no longer stood beside them, and they should have found some way-because, even now, Bunny's mind _insisted_ there had to be a way-to take Pitch with them.

"How do you know they're gone?"

Jack's sudden question startled them all from their reverie, and Bunny turned with the others to frown at their youngest member.

"What do you mean?" Tooth asked before any of the others could, her confusion as blatantly apparent in her voice as it was on her face.

"How do you know they're gone?" Jack repeated without flinching. "Katherine, Nightlight, and…and Ombric?"

"Look 'round, Jack," North said, as though it was obvious, and Bunny shared the sentiment. "Do you see them?"

"No," Jack admitted. "But that doesn't mean they didn't survive. You said yourselves that you were all someone before you were chosen, and you didn't just mean before you were chosen to become Guardians. Manny changed you all just like he changed me, how do you know your friends will still look like they did before? How do you know they'll remember who you are? Or who _they_ are? I certainly didn't. They could still be out there, somewhere, if you only knew where to look."

The Big Four exchanged shocked glances, not one of them quite able to believe they had not thought of such a thing themselves. But then, none of them had been born bereft of the recollections of who they had been prior to becoming what they were now. That experience had apparently been reserved for Jack…or had it? Could Nightlight and Katherine and even Ombric truly be out their somewhere, in different forms but still as much their old selves as ever? Had they, perhaps, been passing their friends by without even realizing it, too wound up in their own duties to take note of the other members of their world? It was both a crushing and uplifting thought, but Bunny would not allow his mounting hope to grow into something dangerously large. Jack's idea was not without merit, but it had no proof, and he would not hope for what could be an impossibility until he knew that same hope were not going to be dashed into as many little pieces as Jack's staff.

Speaking of which…

"So you understand, now, why Pitch didn't accept your offer?" he probed, drawing Jack's gaze to his own with the question.

"Yes," Jack answered simply. "He didn't have a choice. The Fearlings wouldn't let him make any decision but the one he did."

"I'm not so sure that's true," Tooth frowned, not as certain of the subject matter as those who had been there at the conversation's beginning, but catching on fairly swiftly. "He used to fight their control before, but now…now he just _lets_ them use him."

"Because Seraphina is gone," Bunny reminded her. "It's not like we were expecting anything different after _that_ happened."

"What happened has happened," North interjected pragmatically. "We must focus now on present things."

Bunny nodded slowly, though inwardly he wished North had waited a little bit longer before dropping that reminder on them all. As Tooth and Sandy both fluttered closer to Jack to ask after his health Bunny allowed himself to drop into the background, ignoring the sting of the icy floor on his bare paws as he folded his arms and frowned darkly at the space above Jack's head. No amount of reminiscing and explanations could change the fact they were still as without an answer as they had been several hours ago, and with each minute that ticked by Bunny knew their window of opportunity to fix this mess was slowly but surely closing. Jack might seem fine now, but it was only a matter of time before the consequences Aur had told him of came into affect, and then what would they do?

"We'll find a way," North rumbled beside him, and Bunny jumped slightly, wondering how he could have missed someone _that_ large creeping up on him.

Squashing that thought, and blaming its very existence on exhaustion, he answered.

"We'd better. I'm not going to lose another one, North. I _won't_."


	21. Chapter 20: Come What May

**A/N: So I seem to be getting back into the swing of things now writing wise *fingers crossed*, so I thought I'd treat you all with another chapter, albeit a slightly shorter one than my usual fare. I wouldn't say we're exactly heading back into action, but most of the flashbacky-like material is done now and we're racing towards a conclusion of the major plotline. I doubt whether all the little side plots that have popped up in this tale both intentionally and not will be closed by the end, but we'll see.**

**So in this chapter I offer you an explanation for some of the Man in the Moon's apparent negligence, and also a glimpse of how much of an affect Pitch's nightmares are still having on Jack without him even realizing their full impact.**

**Read, review, and try not to drown in the angst.**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 20**

**-Come What May-**

In the wake of the memories that had been unearthed from their longstanding graves and laid out in the daylight once more the Guardians did not gravitate towards one another. Instead they drifted apart, one by one, starting from the moment when Jack excused himself from their company with a plea of exhaustion. Personally, North believed the winter spirit had simply wanted a chance to think on what he had been told in private, and the Guardian of Wonder could not blame him for having such a desire. The truth of Pitch's origins was a hard pill to swallow. To have a force of evil given a humane side, a side North himself might once have admired, only made the task of beating the shadows back into the corners where they belonged all the more difficult. But, then, Jack had seemed more like Katherine in that regard, able to identify with Pitch on a level the other Guardians could not. Was it their youth, he wondered, that made them believe there must be some small shred of decency hidden behind the many cloaks of darkness? Or was there truly something to see that the Guardians were blind to?

A pointless question, perhaps, and one unlikely to receive an answer, but North was troubled, and his mind wandered where it willed and took his feet with it. From the Tower Room through the many halls and down the elevator until he found himself standing in the Room of Remembrance.

The room's construction had been of the Yetis doing, their effort to honor those who had fallen in woven images that adorned every wall and chronicled the era North would have dearly liked to forget. He ignored those tapestries, going to the opposite side of the room, where a giant length of woven cloth hung draped across an entire wall. The village of Santoff Claussen was depicted by its soft threads, a dozen children in the midst of one of their never-ending games whilst the adults looked on and, standing slightly apart from the rest, the Guardians of Childhood watched with laughter on their lips and in their faces. It was an image of perfection, an image that had been shattered entirely in the wake of Pitch's most evil mechanizations, and North remembered many long years of pretended happiness after his rebirth.

The Guardians had been a family once before, close knit and near inseparable, and it had been a rare thing indeed for one member not to see another for more than a month. The loss of Ombric had only drawn them closer together, because the old wizard had been considered the patriarch of their odd little family by most, but when they had lost the children...That grief had made them drift apart, slowly but steadily, each finding their solace in isolation.

It was also at that time, North recalled, that Manny had stopped speaking with them. The Guardians had never been sure whether that was due to the Winter War weakening their patron or simply because Manny had been as wounded by their losses as they were. But perhaps they had been wrong on both counts, and the Man in the Moon had simply expended too much energy and power in keeping _all_ of the Guardians of Childhood alive to continue conversing with them as he once had. It almost hurt, to think that Katherine might be out there somewhere without any memory of who he was, and his hand instinctively reached for the hidden pocket sown into the lining of his shirt, and the treasured compass that lay within.

It had been a gift to his first and dearest friend, the girl he loved as a sister, and it had been all he was able to find of her in the wake of that last battle. It had been meant as a promise that he would always come for her should she need his aid, the needle pointing always to 'N', to himself. But, in the end, Nightlight and Katherine had faced their chosen danger alone, and each had met their end with only the other beside them. He had failed to keep his unspoken promise, and it was a failure that had long burned in his heart.

"I wish you were here now," he spoke aloud, ignoring the curious glances sent his way by those of his helpers passing through the hallway outside the open door. "Always full of good ideas you were, no doubt about that. You would have known answer."

There was no reply to his wistful utterance, and he immediately chided himself for having expected one in the first place. He should not even be here, wallowing in the past, when Jack was in trouble, but he couldn't shake the feeling that was where the answers lay. A memory flickered across his mind, of a bright young girl smiling up at him as she spoke a chant stronger than any magic he had learnt since.

"I believe, I believe, I believe," he echoed numbly. "But in what?"

But the room remained empty of the voice he expected to reply, and North's shoulders slumped in dejection as he realized the hopelessness of the situation. This was a battle they were going to lose, and there seemed nothing he could do that would change that.

"North?" he turned at the gentle intrusion, watching as Tooth slipped into the room and gently pushed the door to before fluttering across the room to join him. "I thought I might find you here." Her gaze traveled from his face to the weaving on the wall, and a soft smile adorned her features. "It was a beautiful place."

He nodded, voiceless, and she patted him gently on the shoulder in a gesture of comfort.

"We won't let him have Jack as well," she told him firmly. "We'll find a way. In fact, I think we need to have another look at that staff. Bunny was telling me what the seasonals told him, and if Aur is right the staff can still be repaired. We just need to figure out how."

"Yes," North said slowly, then shook himself abruptly, casting off what memories burdened his mind. "Yes, you are right. Staff is key, and we shall not stop looking until we have found keyhole!"

"Agreed," Tooth said solemnly. "And Bunny and Sandy feel the same. All we need now are the pieces. Where did you put them?"

"Me?" North stared at her in bewilderment. "I put nowhere. We gave to Jack, remember, and Jack left in room."

"He can't have!" Tooth protested, a panicked look entering her eyes. "The box wasn't there, North, I'm sure of it."

"It must be..." North argued, refusing to believe otherwise as he bustled past Tooth and out of the room. Yetis and elves alike parted to let his barreling form through, and, by the time he reached the winter spirit's room North had a following of more than just the other Guardians.

Throwing the door open with a force that was heedless of Jack's apparent desire for rest, North froze in abject horror, because the tiny chest containing the staff fragments was not the only thing missing from the room.

"Jack?" Tooth darted past him, turning this way and that in a fruitless effort to find the chamber's occupant. "Jack, where are you?"

"How could he have gotten out without us knowing?" Bunny demanded, whilst Sandy gestured frantically with sand images that made little sense, distorted as they were by the short Guardian's agitation. "The Yetis were watching the door and he can't bloody well fly!"

North touched his pocket on instinct, and felt the blood drain from his face as the cold realization of its emptiness leapt to his lips to escape in a terrible whisper of guilt.

"Snowglobe..."

* * *

Jack stumbled slightly as he exited the portal, lurching towards the nearest tree and slamming his back against it as he fought to still his thundering heart and the jelly-like tremble in his legs. He could hardly believe what he had done, and the sheer enormity of it was all but overwhelming. But he hadn't been able to stay in the North Pole. He couldn't. Not when he knew what would inevitably occur. The Winter War the Big Four had told him of had _killed_ them, there was no getting around that rather startling fact, and Jack was deadly afraid of doing the same thing. He knew he must have come close, lost as he had been in the throes of Pitch's Nightmare World. Though he had done his best not to think of it since he awoke, the memories still lingered, fresh as the late evening air, in his mind.

He could well remember how time had become a thing no longer linear inside his head. It had pitched and heaved, twisting in bewildering circles, dropping him in visions of a horrid past only to jerk him to those of a brighter future. He had seen faces from his memories, past and present meshing together in disorientating shadows, but they were gone sooner than he could recognize them as everything shifted once more, never still for more than a few moments. He had stopped reacting to the dark memories long before he actually awoke, knowing their outcome was inevitable no matter what he did. He had ignored the shadowy fingers that stretched out to seize him, and paid no heed to the glowing yellow hands that beat them back. At the time he had thought both were surely an illusion, and had therefore determined not to give credence to their existence by recognizing their presence. Even now he was not certain what had been real or not, his mind still undecided on a great many things, and not at all aided by the fact he could not truly tell one apart from the other.

There had been no sudden moment of clarity when he awoke. No abrupt realization that one had been slumber and the other was reality, for the horrors that had inhabited his dreams seemed just as real as the sand figurines that had danced across the ceiling above him as he lay on his back and stared blankly upwards. It was for that reason he had hesitated, breathing in slowly as he waited for the peaceful image to dissolve, for the nightmare to come crawling back in. Only when the expected shadows remained conspicuously absent had he dared to turn his head to the side.

Sandy, looking unutterably weary even in slumber, had been dozing in an oversized armchair at his bedside, his sand creations continuing their intricate dance independent of their creator's control. A weight on the end of the bed had drawn his attention away from Sandy and he had glanced downwards to see Tooth half splayed across the foot of the mattress, as sound asleep as her fellow Guardian. He had waited with baited breath but still nothing changed, and he had realized with a slow dawning realization that this...this was _truth_. He was not looking upon another terrible illusion of Pitch's making. This _was_ his room at the North Pole, and the Guardians who slept beside him had been driven to such exhaustion by the battle they had waged on his behalf. And he _knew_ a battle had been fought. Not even Pitch's mechanizations had been able to hide that, and he had been able to feel the sheer determination and willpower behind the invisible hands that reached to wrench him from the abyss when the darkness grew too deep.

He had made an effort not to wake them as he slipped away, slightly guilty about doing so, but needing the solitude and space enough to get his thoughts in order and try and figure out what, exactly, had happened to him. He remembered Pitch burning the shard-and sincerely wished he didn't-but what had transpired since remained an indecipherable tangle of shadows in his mind, and what little time he had had to think hadn't helped. Not with all the information North and the others had lumped atop that already swimming around in his mind.

He was confused, terribly, terribly confused, hurting, and scared. His staff was gone and his powers, whilst seeming subdued at the present, were but the right provocation away from becoming deadly. He did not know what he was going to do, or how he could possibly hope to continue being a Guardian now, and the unfailing determination that had carried him through every other hardship in his life seemed to have deserted him. He could see no way out of this calamity, the lingering reach of what Pitch had done stretching on into the foreseeable future, and, though he knew he no longer had to face such things alone, the instinct to seek solitude, a place to hide himself away from the world, was still far too strong to ignore.

The wind, as if just suddenly noticing his presence in its midst once more, rushed to embrace him and, sucking in a sharp breath of the crisp coolness it brought with it, Jack closed his eyes and let it curl its chilled fingers around him. Mere days ago that would have been invitation enough to leapt upon its back and dance across the sky in a flurry of snowflakes. Now, though...now he could do nothing but take comfort from the fact it did not recoil from him as all others surely would. His cold nature had robbed him of so many chances of companionship in the past, and now it was going to prove Bunny's harsh judgment, uttered months ago and all but forgotten, absolutely right.

He wasn't fit to be a Guardian.

Perhaps he never had been.

They were not unfamiliar thoughts, but, for some reason, they did not ring as true this second time around. He had already been through the self-doubt and trauma that had led to his saving all his new comrades and finding his first believer, so why do the same again? He _was_ fit to be a Guardian, even if he had struggled with all the changes that title had brought to his life, he knew he could be a good Guardian when given that chance.

But his chance was gone now. It had slipped through his fingers as surely as the ashes of his staff shard had trickled through Pitch's own, and with it had gone the fragments of this new life he had built. The Guardians would stand by him even now, they had proved how far they would go on his account, and it was far further than Jack would have expected, but...but he could not let them continue to do so. He remembered all too well the blood on Bunny's arm, from a wound _he_ had inflicted, and he knew he was as great a danger to his spirit friends as he was to the children he cared about just as much. No one was safe around him anymore, and it was that thought that had driven him to act on the impulse that ran through his mind. The snowglobe had been an easy acquisition, slipped from North's pocket whilst the big Guardian was preoccupied, and getting the other Guardians to leave him alone long enough to use it had also been a simple matter.

Tearing himself away, on the other hand, had been much, _much_ harder than he expected.

He had forced himself to act regardless of the difficulty, because he knew he could not go to the Guardians and explain his need to be away from them. They would try to keep him with them, a part of the fold, and do their best to help him, but it was not something he could allow. He had lost his family once by sacrificing his own life to keep them safe, he would not lose another for fear of doing the same thing twice.

Folding his arms across his chest he leant his head back against the rough bark of the tree against which he was leaning and stared broodingly up into the green leaves wavering in the breeze above him, searching for answers he knew he would not find there. He wondered briefly how Jamie and Sophie were, deliberately overlaying the dreaded image Pitch had put in his mind with Bunny's reassurances that both were safe. How much had they seen in the Nightmare King's lair? He did not know when they had left the room, unable to tell fact from fiction in his memories of that time, so he had no way of knowing how much of the battle waged between himself and Pitch Jamie had witnessed.

But what did it matter, in the long run? It was not like he could go see Jamie to ask his friend how he felt about what had happened. He couldn't even go to apologize for putting Jamie in danger in the first place, let alone sweet, little Sophie. He couldn't even go to say goodbye, because it _would_ be goodbye, his mind was made up on that account. Pitch wanted to use him as a weapon against the Guardians, and if _they_ had their way he might very well succeed. Jack mean to thwart him, to remove himself from the equation and take away the very advantage Pitch thought he had. He knew places where he could hide that the Guardians would never find him, and, if that didn't work, if his powers became too much for even isolation to contain…Well, if that happened, he knew someone who would be all too happy to eliminate entirely the danger he posed, and who would be all too happy at the prospect of having the opportunity to do so without him fighting back.

Realizing he had closed his eyes at the thought, Jack opened them again, blinking in surprise as he registered the moonbeam dancing down between the rustling leaves, its soft silver light playing over his own pale skin. A slight warmth spread through his fingers where the beam lingered, and he lifted his gaze to the barely visible crescent of the moon peeking through the canopy above him.

"It's too late," he whispered hoarsely, without accusation, because he was far too _numb_ right now to even think about being angry. "It's too late for anything now."


	22. Chapter 21-The Gathering

**A/N: Okeydokey, so this chapter involves OCs and...*trails off and watches as readers run screaming in terror*...Okaaaayyy, maybe shouldn't have mentioned that at the beginning. Anyway, you should all know that this chapter wasn't planned, like, at ALL. It just happened. I mean, seriously, the seasonals were only supposed to have that one little chapter and maybe a few mentions, and now they're taking over the world...oh, wait, that's Pitch. But, yeah, this chapter pretty much leapt up out of nowhere and blindsided me with a good smack to the head, so if it's complete and utter rubbish, that's why.**

**Nevertheless, read, review, and enjoy.  
**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 21**

**-The Gathering-**

The Wind was bewildered.

A storm was brewing, but not one of its own creation. This was no boiling mass of weighted storm clouds, nor was it the heaving rage of a whirling hurricane. Darkness approached instead, sending before it an impending sense of dread. What it heralded the Wind could not predict, but as the sylphs of its eldest child darted back and forth across its back uttering hushed whispers of a growing danger, it sunk into a wary state of its own, becoming still, and letting the world flow on without it. It watched, and it waited, but not even its piercing stare could breach the shroud of shadow, and it knew not what would emerge from the amassing bank of darkness. Before it could consider the matter any further, its attention was drawn from its vigilant watchfulness by the emergence of one it had been seeking even since he disappeared from its fold.

Its missing child had finally ventured back out into the open again, and it hastened forward to greet its wayward ward with a joyous embrace that was received with only a tempered version of the happiness it had expected. Not at all put off, it continued to twirl and bound around the white haired boy, waiting for the moment when he would call it to bear him, when it could toss his light form to great heights and share in his wild hollers of joy. Though he was not of its own making, this one was its favored child, if only for the fact he _was_ yet a child. Its other children had grown and departed from their youth, bearing now the weighted shoulders of adulthood, but the white haired boy...he would forever be a child, and it cherished him all the more for that, knowing he would always answer its playful summons. This time its expectations died swiftly, however, as it observed the vague shadow that clung to the boy's shoulders like a mantle, and felt the grief and loss emanating from him.

Something was wrong.

Something was very, _very_ wrong.

It watched in growing concern as the boy slid down the tree trunk, huddling at its bottom in what seemed to be utter despair. It span and twisted and did its best to gain even the smallest of smiles from him, but nothing that had once worked did so now, and, though it favored this one out of all its children, the boy did not understand its voice the way the others did. Its words were lost in the shrill whistle it made as it wound between the tree trunks and out across the frozen water, and child of frost merely curled himself into a tighter ball, rejecting its touch.

Perplexed and deeply worried, it withdrew a little, dancing above the trees and into the night air above. Its little one needed help, that much was clear, but it did not know where to turn in order to find it. The boy's new friends must surely be looking for him, for the Wind had seen the manner of his entrance into the outside world once more, and felt certain the other four must be soon to follow. But they were nowhere in sight, and, even if they passed by, they understood the Wind's voice no better than the frost child did. No, it could not seek aid from that quarter, and so its thoughts turned to the others, and the one among them who might be willing to help.

Its mind decided, it raced across the tree tops, skimming across great waters and winding its way through the hills and mountains that rose to bar its path. The journey was done in the blink of an eye, and it dipped down to enter the hidden entrance to the burrow, whistling through the narrow passageways and halls, until it dropped at last into the deep Grove hidden beneath the earth. There it paused a moment, sending out seeking tendrils, before a single, cold finger touched upon the one it sought. An auburn head lifted quickly, and mismatched eyes of bronze and green stared almost directly at the Wind's spiraling form.

"Mother?" its child whispered in question.

_Come_, it beckoned earnestly. _Trouble. Come. Help_.

The one it sought rose at once, face set and firm.

"Do no worry, Mother," she said steadily. "I will."

* * *

"You _lost_ him?"

It was strange, Tooth thought dimly, how the disappointed condemnation of a young boy could cut so deeply, but, layered atop feelings of guilt already in existence, those three simple words were a scathing rebuke. "Did you check the lake? Maybe he's there, or...or..."

Jamie's words trailed off in a sharp, painful cough, and the Guardians exchanged anxious glances, Tooth moving forward to gently rub his back. Once the fit had passed he stared beseechingly at the Four Guardians, as if fully expecting them to conjure up a miracle.

"We checked the lake, mate," Bunny said soberly. "Hell, we even scoured the South Pole. He ain't there. We've looked everywhere we can think of, that's why we're here. We were kinda hoping you might know something we don't."

"I don't know where he goes when he's not in Burgess," Jamie whispered hoarsely. "I...I don't know. Please, you have to find him. I think...I think I might be able to help fix what Pitch did, but Jack needs to come here for that."

"What Pitch did?" North repeated. "How did you know 'bout that?"

There was a light whir of swiftly fluttering wings, and Baby Tooth crept sheepishly from where she'd been hiding in the collar of the boy's pajamas.

"Baby Tooth!" the Guardian of Memories exclaimed. "So this is where you've been running off to!"

"She's been helping me," Jamie disclosed with enthusiasm. "We have a way to help Jack." His eagerness faded a little then. "But, if we can't find him..."

"Even if we _do_ find him he won't want to come here," Bunny pointed out, his words backed up by a vehement headshake from the mute member of their quartet. "He's scared he'll hurt you."

"I only need a few moments," Jamie insisted. "Please."

The Foursome exchanged another glance, then Tooth spoke.

"We'll try," she promised.

"Thank you," Jamie gave a quick grin that faltered slightly when all four of the Guardians whirled as one to stare out the window.

"What?" he demanded urgently. "What is it?"

"It's nothing, sweetie," Tooth said quickly, ignoring the way the others were already marching for the exit as she turned to give Jamie a reassuring smile. "Just someone who might know where Jack is. Wait here, okay? I promise we will bring Jack back here if we can."

Jamie offered her a tentative nod, and with one last, meaningful look cast in Baby Tooth's direction, Tooth hastened after the others. She found them several houses down, settled on a rooftop in a silent stare-off with both the Groundhog and the Spirit of Summer, whose darting and flitting sylphs had been what first caught their attention.

"Mara," she greeted them cordially, if with reserve. "Chuck. This is an unexpected surprise."

"Really?" Mara asked pointedly. "Why a surprise? Surely you must have realized that recent events have gone well beyond the sole jurisdiction of the Guardians of Childhood? All spirit kind has been threatened by Pitch's actions, and are still being threatened."

"Oh, not again!" Bunny groaned in protest. "Let me guess, you're here to plan Jack's destruction as well?"

"On the contrary," Mara answered firmly. "Attacking Jack Frost right now would be a recipe for disaster. Unlike Skadi, who chose to flaunt her powers, your little follower has kept his in check. The moment I, or anyone else for that matter, attacks that torrent will be unleashed, and I am in no fit state to deal with that now. Besides, Jack Frost is merely a symptom of the problem, not its source. Pitch is the one we should all be concerned about right now."

"Pitch is done," North said with finality. "We destroyed Nightmare army and scared him away."

"And what were those Nightmares, if not playthings to pass the time?" Mara retorted sharply. "You and I both know his true creations are far more dangerous."

"Yeah, but he has no Fearlings either," Bunny pointed out, Sandy illustrating his words with a dozen sand figurines that dissolved when threatened by miniatures of the Guardians themselves. "We wiped those out during the Winter War."

"And what better way to resurrect them then through the utter terror of a Guardian?" The Spirit of Summer countered, rendering them all silent. "Were you really so naive as to think the extent of Pitch's plan was to rely on Jack losing control? No, his schemes go much deeper than that, and if Jack Frost will not be the instrument of destruction he needs, Pitch will use him to create one more obedient to his will instead."

"Are you saying he plans on bringing the Fearlings back?" Tooth asked in alarm.

"No." Mara shook her head. "I'm saying he already _has_."

* * *

Jack's feet had eventually led him, entirely of their own accord, to the edge of the lake that had drawn him to this location in the first place. The frozen body of water lay in the midst of a thick surrounding forest, isolated enough from civilization that he knew none would walk here at this time of the night. He had found this place during one of his many trips to the colder regions of the Earth and, whilst it was not home the way its match in Burgess was, it was at least familiar enough to be comforting.

He had spent so long slumped against the tree in despair that the Wind had abandoned him and had yet to return, leaving him alone on the edge of the lake with nothing but his dark thoughts and even darker memories to keep him company. He could not look at the frozen water now without remembering Pitch's gleeful proclamation, and the wild light that had been in the dark spirit's eyes as he proudly told Jack _he_ was the one responsible for the winter spirit's untimely departure from the human world. Jack had successfully blocked out all thoughts of his own death in favor of focusing on what few memories he had of his sister, but Pitch had stripped away those walls without mercy, and there was no denying that what he remembered…well, it was just as frightening as it was enlightening.

Wrapping his arms about himself he shivered, staring at his own pale reflection, and ignoring the moon that shone beside him in the natural mirror, its silver crescent slowly being overtaken by the clouds Jack himself had summoned with his dark mood. As the cloud-bank overtook it the silver light bathing his surroundings faded, and the moonbeams that had been dancing at his heels also vanished, disappearing as swiftly and surely as the Wind had, and leaving him alone.

Entirely, completely _alone_.

"Your friends will be searching for you."

Jack started at the strange yet familiar voice that seemed to speak in response to his unvoiced thoughts, whirling quickly, and not relaxing at all when he set eyes on the speaker. Aur might not seem like much of threat, being both shorter and frailer than he in appearance, but too much had happened of late for him to be anything but wary whilst facing the autumn spirit. Not to mention the fact she had not come alone. Standing alongside her was a spirit Jack had never seen before, clad entirely in black with a bow and quiver strapped to his back, dark eyes watching Jack himself with a curious expression. Jack knew who he must be, to his knowledge there was no other among the spirit world who so favored archery, but he had never actually met the other before. Cupid's domain was not so much children as it was adolescents, and, by that age, even those who might once have believed did not.

"We mean you no harm." Aur said quickly, upon seeing his alarm. She raised her hands, palms outwards, and made no move to draw closer, her mismatched eyes meeting his own distrustful gaze pleadingly. "I did not know," she added remorsefully. "About Willow. I would have done all in my power to make her cease had I known how she treated you."

"It doesn't matter now, does it?" he found himself answering bitterly, the full impact of what he had lost all but drowning out everything else. "What are you doing here? And how did you even find me?"

"The Wind summoned me," Aur took a step closer, and Jack wondered if he imagined the worry in her eyes. "And I do not think it was wrong to do so. You seem in need of a friend, Jackson."

"I have plenty of those, didn't you know?" he answered with wry humor. "It's just that I'll probably destroy them if they come near me."

"You will not destroy me," Aur assured him, then, with a wickedness he had almost forgotten she possessed, she added, "Of Eros' safety, I am not so certain."

"Huh," the archer grunted discontentedly. "I'll just leave you two to it, then, shall I?"

Without waiting for a response he spun on his heel and headed for the nearest tree, scaling it with the proficiency of a master. Aur waited until he had disappeared into the foliage entirely, offering them some semblance of privacy, before speaking again.

"I would not have brought him at all," she explained, in answer to Jack's questioning look at her dismissal. "Save that I am not yet recovered enough to ride upon the Wind with any surety, and the Groundhog insisted I not come alone." She gave him a searching look then, and he waited patiently for whatever observance she would surely make. "It would seem the Wind's concern was not unfounded. The shadow of Pitch Black lies upon you, Jackson."

"I know," he whispered, voice barely more than a breath of wind itself. He could still feel the darkness lurking in the back of his mind, but it was only a trace compared to what it had been, and he was able to keep it at bay without much thought.

"Do you, truly?" She was watching him closely. "His taint is a deadly and secretive thing. It may drive you to acts you would not consider otherwise." She hesitated, but only briefly, before continuing, "Your friends _are_ searching for you, will you not go to them?"

"No." He shook his head, the single word firm. "They are better off staying away from me."

"Is that your decision to make?" Aur asked placidly, her voice free of judgment. "It would seem more theirs to me."

"They wouldn't let me go," he answered with another headshake. "They'll insist on staying together, and put themselves at risk by doing so."

"But it is still _their_ choice, is it not?" He turned to glance at her, not quite certain what she was implying. "Whether or not they consider you a cause worth risking their lives for, is the choice not theirs?"

"I could hurt them." He stated the fact as a reason. _The_ reason.

Aur countered with a simple, "They could help you."

"Could they?" he demanded with sudden force. "Could they really? Because I _don't_ know how to fix this, and I don't think you do either." Despite knowing that, he couldn't stop the next words from sounding like a desperate plea. "_Do_ you?"

"Not all answers come from the places you would expect," Aur replied subduedly, her gaze suddenly dark. "You should not rob them of the choice that was laid before you, for you were given the power to choose freely, and it led you to where you now stand."

"What does that mean?" Jack wondered aloud, puzzled.

"I saw you, that day," Aur told him gently, and he felt his breath still in his chest at her words. "I was barely more than a child myself, recently born and spending every day exploring. I saw what you did. What you sacrificed to save her. You made a choice, and it was a noble one, but it _was_ a choice. Do the Guardians not deserve to be accorded the same opportunity?"

"It's not the same," Jack argued, even though he was no longer certain. He was keeping his family safe, and that was what was important, but…_did_ he owe them more than simply running away?

"Isn't it?" Aur inquired, curious. "Perhaps you are right, but if you will not grant them what chance you yourself received, you should at least say goodbye. They have lost enough friends without having the opportunity to say their farewells."

Jack winced at that, remembering what he had been so recently told. It had been made quite clear that North and the others had not received closure on the matter of their lost friends, if they were indeed lost. Was it fair on them to put them through the same experience a second time? But, even if it wasn't, what alternative did he have? It had been hard enough to tear himself away once, he wasn't sure he could do it again, not when they would surely try to convince him to do the exact opposite.

"Is it _really_ such a hard decision, Jack?" He whirled disbelievingly, staring out across the lake to where Pitch stood in its very middle, a confident smile on his face and the Spirit of Spring floating at his side, her hate-filled gaze focused entirely on Jack. "By all means, give the Guardians a chance to say their fond farewells. You can end their miserable existence whilst you're at it."

"Pitch…" he muttered darkly.

At the same time, Aur accused, "Willow? What are you _doing_ with him?"

"What I should have done a long time ago," the Spirit of Spring answered forcefully. "Destroying one who would kill us all, given the chance!"

"I always knew you were a selfish hypocrite," Aur said sharply, and there was condemnation in her voice that Jack had never heard before. This was doubtlessly the Aur who had convinced her sisters to stand against Pitch Black during the Winter War, and Jack could easily see how she had achieved it. Small and frail in appearance she may be, but this one had her own form of strength, and it was a truly marvelous thing to behold. "But I never thought even you would be so foolish as to throw your lot in with the Shadow!"

"Don't you _dare_ judge me for my choices!" Willow all but screamed at her sister. "Not when you stand alongside a _murderer_!"

"Whilst this is all very amusing," Pitch interjected, sounding bored with the sisters' disagreement. "I have simply come to collect what is mine. You two can continue your argument once I am gone."

"There is nothing here for you, Pitch," Aur said stoutly, before Jack could so much as draw breath to speak, as she moved to position herself between him and the Nightmare King. Jack was too surprised by the fact they were fighting over _him_ to voice his protests, and could do nothing but stand and watch the proceedings in mounting confusion and alarm.

"Indeed." Pitch seemed amused by her show of bravado. "You are a fierce little thing, Aur, but I could still snap you in half like a dry twig if it pleased me, so _do not_ get in my way."

He took a threatening step forward as he spoke, then hastily leapt back, staring with distaste at the black shaft now protruding from the thick ice where his foot had been a moment before.

"I wouldn't, Boogeyman," a voice called from the trees. "I really wouldn't."

A moment later Eros revealed himself, simply stepping down from his high perch on what looked to be little more than clouds forming steps to the ground. He slid into place on Aur's other side, his bow, a shade of ebony to match its arrows, already drawn.

"Eros!" Willow exclaimed shrilly. "What are you doing here? And why are you helping _him_?"

"Aur asked nicely," Eros retorted with a sly grin. "And, let's be honest, Willow, you're charm lost its veneer a long time ago. Besides, didn't you know?" He cocked his head to the side, dark eyes sparking with both mirth and danger. "I break hearts just as well as I make 'em sing, and I can see a few before me now in desperate need of a makeover."

"Ah, yes, _Cupid_," Pitch sneered in derision. "This is not your domain, archer, _begone_!"

"Oh, I think you made it my domain when you went about trying to orchestrate another Winter War." Jack could hear the wood of the other spirit's bow creaking as he drew his arrow even further back. "Or have you forgotten how you nearly killed us all with that little stunt?"

"_I _am not the one orchestrating anything," Pitch replied smoothly, his gaze flitting briefly from Eros to Jack's right hand, where the Groundhog had just emerged from a newly made burrow entrance. "If you want to see the cause of the danger you are currently in, look to your right."

There was a searing burst of heat, and the third member of the seasonal triumvirate made her entrance, the scorched ends of her flaxen hair shifting in the hot breeze created by her sylphs, charcoal black eyes bearing into Pitch with open distaste as she hovered in the middle ground between the two parties.

"You are not welcome here, Pitchiner," Mara declared, and Jack flinched slightly at the heat that roared around the Spirit of Summer as she spoke, every touch of her flitting sylphs like a scalding iron applied to his skin. Aur noticed his discomfort and drifted slightly closer, the cooler drafts that surrounded her doing a little to alleviate his pain. "Or you, Willow. Leave, before this turns into something most of us will regret."

"I think _not_," Pitch said slowly and deliberately. "For, if Jack will not play _his_ part in the destruction of each and every one of you who _dares_ to stand in my way, I shall be forced to resort to something far more lethal."

"You have no army," Eros reminded him sharply. "And neither does Willow. We've got you outnumbered, so let's just stop this little stand-off before things get messy."

"Outnumbered? Is that a fact?" Pitch smiled slowly, and Jack braced for the worst, because that expression _never_ denoted something good. "Then, let me ask you something, you fools. What is it that gives me power?" None of those flanking Jack replied-and wasn't the fact they were defending him at all surprising?-but Pitch did not seem to mind, content as usual to monologue without any reception from his audience. "It is fear, of course. Pure, unadulterated fear, and there is no fear so pure as that of a child. That is why they are a far surer source of power than any adult. But, imagine _this, _if you will; an immortal child, with three hundred years of hidden fears and buried insecurities suddenly brought into the light. Why, it's a veritable feast, and exactly what I needed to bring back the very things you all seem to think have been destroyed. Tell me, how many of you remember what a _true_ Fearling looks like?"

It began as a growing sense of dread in the pit of his stomach, an overwhelming terror that crawled through his veins and made his heart thrum wildly in his chest. Jack raised his head, and stared in utter dismay at the misty clouds of insubstantial darkness that had formed all around the lake, ringing them in as efficiently as any fence could have. These were no Nightmares, no corrupted creations of the Sandman with good still yet inside them. These were pure evil. Ghoulish shades that were all the more terrifying for their lack of substance, and had their very presence not warned him as to the danger of their nature, the reactions of his unexpected companions would have.

The spirits closed ranks around him, forming a tight circle as they backed slowly onto the ice, taking up a position in the lake's centre where Pitch had been a moment before, hemmed in by an overwhelming number of adversaries. The Nightmare King was hovering above the battle now, Willow darting back and forth uncertainly beside him. Whatever remorse she might be feeling now was immaterial however, for the emotion was wholly absent in her chosen partner.

"Now then," Pitch said with a small smile. "Let the reign of fear begin."

**Character Key:**

**_Aur_-Spirit of Autumn**

_**Willow-**_**Spirit of Spring**

**_Mara_-Spirit of Summer**

**_Skadi_-Dead Spirit of Winter**

_**Chuck/Groundhog-**_**Watcher of the Seasons**

_**Eros/Cupid-**_**Spirit of Love**

**_Wind_-?**

* * *

**Preview for CHAPTER 22**

**-The Choice****-**

"Can I just say that I do _not_ like this plan?"

"You have said, Bunny, many times," North answered, cracking the reins to encourage a little more speed from the reindeer they were attached to. The sleigh lurched in response, and Bunny sucked in a sharp breath, resisting the urge to close his eyes as he clung to the side of the airborne vehicle for dear life. He _knew_ why they needed to be in the air, why the Groundhog had insisted he and Mara go in first and ensured the other spirits now embroiled in this battle did not allow Jack to come to harm, but that didn't mean he had to _like_ it.

"Bunny…" Beside him, Tooth's voice was barely more than an awed whisper. "_Look_."

Forcing back his natural fear of heights, Bunny slowly pulled himself up enough to peer over the edge, and immediately forgot his terror as he caught sight of what lay below them.

He could scarcely believe his eyes.

From the vantage point of the sleigh it was all too easy to see the Fearlings practically swarming the lake below, ringing in a pitifully small band of defenders, whilst Pitch and-was that _Willow_?-looked on from above, seemingly content to watch as their enemies were driven into the ground by sheer force of numbers.

"Not good," he growled under his breath. "_Very_ not good…_North_!"

"I see, Bunny," the Christmas Guardian responded, tugging on the reins and sending the sleigh banking sharply to the right, very nearly tipping Bunny from his seat. The Easter Guardian scrabbled for a handhold, and when he had regained his balance enough to look over the side once more he found himself standing face to face with the entity commonly known as Cupid, who was currently balancing on one of the sleigh's runners.

"Hello there," the Valentine spirit said with a grin, already nocking another arrow in preparation for an aerial shot. "It's about time you lot showed up." He loosed the projectile and a quick flash of his teeth let Bunny know his target had fallen. "We had to start the party without you, I'm afraid."

"Where's Jack?" Tooth demanded instantly.

"With Chucky and the only two seasonals still in possession of their minds," Eros answered glibly. "They're waiting on you, so try not to take too long."

With that stern command he executed a backflip off the sleigh's runner, taking what shots he could as he soared back down into the midst of the enemy.

"That one's a few eggs short of a basket," the Easter Guardian muttered, before scrambling to the fore of the sled, trying not to think of the tremendous drop off either side. "North, park this thing! We need to get down there and help out!"


	23. Chapter 22-The Choice

**A/N: Can I just say that I hate government departments? Like, a LOT. I've had a really crappy week off the end of a hectic weekend (not entirely in a good way, either) all because they can't do their jobs properly so _I _get punished for their general uselessness, because apparently it's alright to harass and borderline bully people even when you're the one who screwed up. **

**Such things do not put one in a good mood for writing, hence the lateness of the update.**

**Fair warning also that this chapter has not been proofread to my usual standard. I will come back and edit it later, but if there are more mistakes than usual it's because I didn't take my usual care. Feel free to point out typos, plotholes etc as you normally would. You guys are basically my BETA readers, and I love you for it.**

**A HUGE thank you to all those people who brought the review count to over six hundred over the past week, especially to those guest reviewers who I can't thank personally, and the ones who have their private messaging disabled. You guys are all just awesome, and you have no idea how much your positive feedback has been used as a shield against real life these past few days.**

**Read, review, and enjoy.**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 22**

**-The Choice-**

Jack had been in the eye of the storm countless times before. It was where he thrived, in the midst of that virulent chaos that came with the strongest blizzard his gifts could muster. He never felt freer than when the Wind howled all around him, shrieking out its joy and freedom in a voice so few appreciated. But, for all that he knew and loved storms, both those created by him and not, he had _never_ seen one such as this before.

The cloudbank that had been amassing when he first set foot on the lake's edge was now a roiling, black mass, thick with the bright and searing flash of lightning. The boom of thunder made the ice shudder beneath his feet, and seemed to vibrate in the air around him. What struggle was going on in the heavens above, however, was nothing at all compared to the Fearlings that had gathered on the shore, forming a cloud of darkness that was easily as ominous and threatening as the thunderhead itself. Jack stood frozen, his thoughts having ground to a halt, and his mind crippled by a terror greater than any he had experienced before. Not even when his sister and he were stranded on the lake had he felt a tremor so paralysing, a dread so great he _could not move_.

Something crashed into his side, and he stumbled, his gaze ripped away from the Fearlings back to the spirits that surrounded him. He watched in some confusion as Eros, whose bow had been what caught him as the archer turned, ripped his arrows from his back and closed a cap across the top of his quiver, flipping the holder over to remove the lid at the opposite end, and then reattaching the container to his back, the ends of the arrows now protruding from its top fletched in red and white.

"Eros, what are you _doing_?" the Groundhog demanded incredulously. "Your love arrows and pink fluffy clouds of romance aren't going to do anything against _them_."

"Wrong," Eros cut him off, whipping an arrow from his back as the Fearlings finally moved forward, stepping out onto the ice. They took their time, clearly aware of the fact they had their prey utterly trapped, and thus gave the Valentine spirit plenty of time to choose his target. The bolt pierced one of the shadowy creatures, and it dissolved with a shriek of horror. Eros tilted his head slightly to give the Groundhog a sidelong glance. "Fearlings aren't all that fond of love. It's one of very few things that can conquer fear."

"Great," Chuck muttered, bracing himself as the Fearlings, having seen one of their own fall, suddenly hastened their approach. "You just made them mad."

"I have that effect on everyone," Eros quipped, turning to fire at a Fearling foolish enough to outrun its comrades. It fell, and a dozen others clambered over its dissolving form without the slightest bit of hesitation. "Chuck?"

"Split up!" the Groundhog ordered. "And don't let them touch you!"

Both seasonal spirits obeyed instantly, but Jack found himself unable to move, his fear crawling back to choke him before he could convince himself to move. Seeing this, Eros seized him by the shoulders, giving him a sharp, unforgiving shake.

"Think of someone!" the Valentine spirit ordered. "_Anyone_ you care about. Focus on them, and only _them_." Turning Jack about, Eros then shoved him in the direction of the Groundhog. "Stay with Chuck, I'm going to give them something to chase."

* * *

"Can I just say that I do _not_ like this plan?"

"You have said, Bunny, many times," North answered, cracking the reins to encourage a little more speed from the reindeer they were attached to. The sleigh lurched in response, and Bunny sucked in a sharp breath, resisting the urge to close his eyes as he clung to the side of the airborne vehicle for dear life. He _knew_ why they needed to be in the air, why the Groundhog had insisted he and Mara go in first to ensure the other spirits now embroiled in this battle did not allow Jack to come to harm, but that didn't mean he had to _like_ it.

"Bunny…" Beside him, Tooth's voice was barely more than an awed whisper. "_Look_."

Forcing back his natural fear of heights, Bunny slowly pulled himself up enough to peer over the edge, and immediately forgot his terror as he caught sight of what lay below them.

He could scarcely believe his eyes.

From the vantage point of the sleigh it was all too easy to see the Fearlings practically swarming the lake below, ringing in a frighteningly small band of defenders, whilst Pitch and-was that _Willow_?-looked on from above, seemingly content to watch as their enemies were driven into the ground by sheer force of numbers.

"Not good," he growled under his breath. "_Not _good at _all_…_North_!"

"I see, Bunny," the Christmas Guardian responded, tugging on the reins and sending the sleigh banking sharply to the right, very nearly tipping Bunny from his seat. The Easter Guardian scrabbled for a handhold, and when he had regained his balance enough to look once more he found himself standing face to face with the entity commonly known as Cupid, who was currently balancing on one of the sleigh's runners.

"Hello there," the Valentine spirit said with a grin, already nocking another arrow in preparation for an aerial shot. "It's about time you lot showed up." He loosed the projectile and a quick flash of his teeth let Bunny know his target had fallen. "We had to start the party without you, I'm afraid."

"Where's Jack?" Tooth demanded instantly.

"With Chucky and the only two seasonals still in possession of their minds," Eros answered glibly. "They're waiting on you, so try not to take too long."

With that stern command he executed a backflip off the sleigh's runner, taking what shots he could as he soared back down into the midst of the enemy via a series of reverse somersaults off the white, puffy clouds that obliging formed to bear his weight.

"That one's a few eggs short of a basket," the Easter Guardian muttered, before scrambling to the fore of the sled, trying not to think of the tremendous drop off either side. "North, park this thing! We need to get down there and help out!"

"Not yet!" the Christmas Guardian cut him off. "We must stick to plan."

"They'll be slaughtered!" Bunny argued, unable to tear his eyes off the swiftly shrinking patch of ice below, his nerves twisted into an uncomfortable ball that sat like a lead weight in the pit of his stomach. "We _have_ to go now."

"Groundhog told us to wait…" North protested, though Bunny could see his resolve wavering.

"If we wait there won't be anyone _to_ help," he said decisively. "It's time to change the plan, mate. We go."

"Alright." North gave a grim nod. "But need opening first. Tooth, Sandy, clear a path!"

"On it!"

As one, the two airborne guardians left the safety of the sleigh, and it was at that precise moment their enemy became aware of them, the swirling mass of Fearlings below suddenly reacting to the new presence.

"North!" Bunny bellowed a second time, well aware that the two Guardians now in flight could not hope to protect them against all…all _that_. "We've got incoming!"

"I know," the Guardian of Wonder assured him, and Bunny wasn't entirely sure he liked the strange glint that had worked its way into his friend's eyes. "Hold on, Bunny, things are about to get…_interesting_."

* * *

Pitch soared above the battle on a cloud of thick nightmare sand that shifted and shuddered as it formed and reformed in order to allow him an unobstructed view of the frantic fight for survival taking place below him. Driving his enemy out onto the ice had ensured that the Groundhog's method of retreat was cut off, and with none of the seasonal spirits in much of a condition to fly that left only the irritating Cupid's cloud-hopping skills as a means of escape, and Eros was far too busy trying to defend the more vulnerable members of his little band of renegades to get more than a foot of the ground. It was amusing, really, to see Aur and Mara scrabbling to protect Jack despite the fact the latter posed as great a danger to the winter spirit as Pitch's own Fearlings, and, in their own turn, the Groundhog and his bow-wielding compatriot doing their very best to defend the sisters, whose vulnerabilities were no longer hidden from those who sought to destroy them. They were doomed, and the only reason Pitch hadn't ordered his newborn following to finish this laughable battle quickly was because his desired audience had yet to make an appearance.

Once the Guardians arrived, this would all end.

"What are you _doing_?"

The horrified demand came from his right, and Pitch belatedly remembered that he had not come alone. He had needed Willow to help him find Jack, taking full advantage of the seasonal's ability to read the Wind, and it had been ridiculously easy to buy her aid in return for a promise to end Jack Frost once and for all. For all her attempts to appear above her peers, Willow was nothing if not naïve, and she had brought into his lies like the foolish child she truly was. And, just like a child, she now vented her displeasure at being deceived without the slightest restraint.

"Eliminating Jack Frost," he replied coolly, not bothering to meet the gaze he could feel burning into his back. "Is that not what you wanted?"

"This is not what we agreed! You said you only wanted Jack, that if I led you to him…" She trailed off, and he sensed the moment when her fury turned to something like despair, her next words a sheer, frantic plea. "My _sisters_ are down there!"

Pitch turned to her, his gaze cold and unrelenting. "They should not have gotten in the way."

"They don't know what they are doing!" she argued feverishly. "Please, _please_ don't hurt them. They're my…they're my _sisters_, please."

"I am surprised you even remember as much." He smirked at her, reminding her of the division she had wrought between herself and her siblings with her unrelenting hatred. A hatred that still brewed inside of her, but was buried now beneath thick layers of fear. Willow had always been afraid of loss, and now she faced one greater than even the destruction of her nymphs at her own sister's hands. Pitch could not help but revel in her utter anguish. "The answer is _no_, Willow. Their crimes are unforgivable, and they will pay the price."

"You…you can't…" she stammered, emerald eyes wide in distress, but Pitch simply turned away. "You…_no_! I won't _let_ you!"

She flew at him, but Pitch had seen that course of action coming long before she decided upon it. Gliding on the solid surface formed by his nightmare sand he easily sidestepped her attack, closing a vicelike hand about her wrist, and yanking her arm back over her head as he met her wide-eyed, fear-filled gaze with disgust.

"I had such high hopes for you, Willow," he murmured in anger. "But you are just as weak as the rest of them. You want to stand on their side now, do you? Very well, go _die_ with them!"

He ignored her shriek of protest as he threw her from the heights, using his dark sand to ensure her flight carried her all the way to the frozen lake below. The Fearlings parted briefly to spare themselves being crushed beneath her insubstantial weight, but they closed the space they had opened swiftly, and Willow vanished from Pitch's sight. Turning back to the main participants he stifled a small sigh of regret. It would have been a pleasant change to have someone to share his triumph with once the day was won, but Pitch certainly did not _need_ Willow, or any other for that matter, to see that victory become a reality. The Guardians had had neither the foresight to stop him nor the ability to even see what was coming, and now his path to ruling the kingdom of fear he had envisaged for so long was clear. All that remained now was to clear away the pitiful few that stood in his way, and, as the clear tinkling of sleigh bells pierced the night air, Pitch could not hold back a small smile of victory.

His time had finally come.

He had _won_.

* * *

Jack had never felt like such a helpless bystander as he did now.

The battle was raging on all around him, Aur and Mara sticking as near to him as possible, with the former's abilities thankfully cancelling out any ill affects that might have occurred from the latter's, whilst Eros and Chuck, who was remarkably agile given his no less than stubby stature, moved in a wider circle. But, even as he watched them fight and _knew _they were outmatched in both numbers and sheer, brutal strength, Jack could do nothing to help them. Unleashing his own powers would as likely cause further harm than good, and the best he could hope to do was stay out of the fighters way as much as possible, something that was becoming increasingly difficult as the space the defenders had to move about became smaller and smaller. Dividing their numbers had worked for only a short while before they were forced together again, and he soon found himself hedged in completely by the four other spirits, pressed so closely together he had nowhere to escape from Mara's heat, and was forced to simply grit his teeth and bear the pain.

"You _have_ got a way out of this, right, Chucky?" Eros' quiver, which Jack could have sworn should have been empty now, was poking him in the side, and he had to duck slightly to avoid the archer's elbow as he continuously switched targets, seemingly undecided as to which of their many, _many_ assailants to attack first.

"Course I do," the Groundhog retorted shortly. "And you're it." Jack stumbled slightly as the short creature banged into his legs. "Take the stairs, Valentine."

"I _told_ you not to call me that," Eros grumbled, even as he seized Jack's arm, ignoring the confused look the winter spirit shot him. "You any good at acrobatics, kid?"

"Well, I…"

Jack didn't get a chance to finish his sentence, because before he could even open his mouth Eros had already taken them airborne, bounding from one cloud to another as though the miraculously forming puffs of whiteness were trampolines. Jack, dragged along for the ride with no choice in the matter, took a moment of time to briefly be grateful for the fact he did not share Bunny's distaste for heights and was indeed quite an accomplished aerial acrobat himself, because Eros' method of transport would have been nothing short of terrifying were he not. His surprisingly light thoughts were shattered by an ear-splitting shriek as something sped past them both with enough speed to leave a stiff breeze trailing in its wake, and a discomfortingly close lightning strike told him they had gone as high as they dared. Before he could do more than blink in surprise at the dazzling light show his attention was diverted a second time as he caught sight of the pitching and banking sleigh hurtling through the air towards them, Eros carefully angling their path so as to intercept the approaching sled.

But he was not the only one to see it coming.

The Wind rose suddenly in warning and Eros twisted in the air, but the disadvantage of not being in actual _flight_ and subject to gravity was an insurmountable obstacle in escaping the sudden danger. The band of airborne Fearlings slammed into them with force, proving that, no matter how insubstantial their appearance, they were very, _very _solid, and Jack faintly registered Eros using his own body as a shield before they crashed through a snow bank and rebounded off one of the trees below with a thud, though a louder crack easily supplanted its importance. Jack rolled onto his stomach with a groan just in time to see Pitch bring his foot down hard on Eros' bow a second time, ensuring the weapon was severed completely in half.

"I've been wanting to do that for a _long_ time," he laughed. "What good are your precious arrows now, Cupid?"

Eros' response was to leap up from the forest floor with an outraged cry, an arrow in hand as he flung himself at a startled Pitch, the bolt's tip finding a home in the Nightmare King's shoulder despite his attempt to evade it. Eros'victory was short lived, however, as Pitch used his opposite arm to seize the archer's own, his eyes blazing with barely concealed fury as he twisted the limb with brutal strength, ignoring Eros' suddenly frantic attempts to free himself. Breathless and winded, Jack watched with wide eyes as Pitch seemed to _grow _on the spot, a great shadow falling on the white snow behind him as his amber eyes glowed with a menacing light.

"Close combat doesn't suit you, archer," the former general sneered. "I should break every bone in your body for daring to stand against me, but _that_ would be a waste of my time, now _get out of my way_!"

With a raw power that could only have come from the sudden rebirth of his army of Fearlings, Pitch threw Eros away from him as if the other spirit was little more than a child's toy. Jack watched in horror as the archer slammed into a nearby tree, sliding down it to all but vanish in the snow at its bottom, almost completely buried by that which fell from its laden boughs. No matter how much he willed the other to rise, Eros remained still where he had fallen, and Jack was acutely aware of the fact he was now utterly alone, facing one who was quite possibly the most dangerous spirit in existence.

"Its your turn, Jack," Pitch stated with icy calm, and, his attention drawn back to the dark spirit, Jack hastened to push himself to his feet, backing away from Pitch as quickly as his trembling limbs would allow. "Your last chance. Join me now and I will spare your friends. They will have a place in my new world. Resist, and I will set you loose and make _you_ destroy them."

"Your promises don't mean anything, Pitch!" He all but stammered the words, an icy terror clawing at his insides as though trying to choke him from within, and some distant, still rational part of his mind screamed a warning that what he was feeling was no accident, and it was Pitch's hand he sensed in this.

"But my threats do," Pitch was standing right before him now, a cold smile on his face. "So _choose_."

Jack opened his mouth, to speak or scream or cry he did not know, but whatever action had outrun his mind never occurred, for Pitch was tossed with sudden and brutal force to the side, a thick, green vine snaking in the air of its own accord in stack contrast to the white winterland that surrounded it.

"You will not unleash that terror on the world as second time!" Willow raged, and, for all that Jack had seen her angry before, he had never seen such complete fury as that which now shone upon her visage.

Pitch rose laughing, oblivious to her fury, and Jack _knew_ he was not imagining the growth in the dark spirit's size this time. A size meant to intimidate, to be _feared_.

"And what makes you think you have the power to stop me?" he demanded, his voice taking on a deeper note that echoed slightly, a resounding, repeating boom inside Jack's head. "Really, Willow, this was all _your_ doing. You gave me the key, the _power_, and I _used_ it. You may look now upon the corrupted fruits of your own misguided labours, and know that it wasn't your sister who caused this, it was _you_."

"Then it is my mistake to set right," Willow answered coolly, pointedly ignoring Jack's presence, or indeed the fact he even existed. Her next words were spoken with vindictive determination, "And I shall enjoy every second of it."

"No, my dear," Pitch said with dark intent. "I'm rather afraid that you won't."

* * *

"Jack, _no_!"

Tooth's cry of horror was matched by the screams from below as the Fearlings finally overcame their adversaries and the spirits of the seasons scattered in a vain effort to survive, each trying to find their own way to safe ground. The Wind was howling all around them, and North could heard Bunny shouting something that was lost in the roaring gale. Whatever he was saying did not matter in the long run, however, for North had eyes only for the path his friends had followed as they fell, and he did not hesitate to haul on the reins, forcing the reindeer off their path in a sharp—and not strictly safe—movement that cast the Fearlings still latched onto their tail into momentary disarray.

"Sandy!" he roared over the voice of the Wind. "Help the others. We get Jack!"

In a burst of golden sand, the Guardian of Dreams hastened to the rescue of their comrades, and, trusting Sandy to handle both himself and those now in his charge, North turned his attention to finding Jack and Eros, the two whom Pitch had chosen to pursue. Tooth darted off ahead, but her eyes would not be needed to find their missing friends, for the sudden appearance of a gigantic vine that seemed to spring from the very earth was a telling enough sign. Dropping the reins entirely North let the reindeer steer themselves, hastening to the rear of the airborne vehicle as he drew his swords, clambering up to stand beside Bunny as the sleigh dipped low over the snow covered forest. The pair exchanged a single, sharp nod, before leaping in tandem from the sleigh's back, falling right into the midst of the confrontation taking place below. Neither of them waited to determine who was attacking whom, hacking their way through all attacks and obstacles that formed in their path, united in their single minded focus on reaching their apparently shell shocked companion. Jack was watching the proceeding with wide eyes, heedless of how close he was to coming to harm, and North did not hesitate to bodily haul him away from the ongoing duel.

A duel, he realized, after a moment to catch his breath and study the unfolding drama, that Willow was losing.

What had driven the Spirit of Spring to attack her own ally to begin with was a mystery, but both now seemed intent on destroying one another, and it was equally apparent that Pitch was bound to be the victor. The resurrection of his Fearlings, or, more accurately, the _fear_ that had allowed him to achieve that very act, was nothing short of an elixir of strength for the Nightmare King, and North did not care to remember the last time he had seen Pitch reach this level of power.

No sooner had that thought crossed his mind than the vines Willow was using to battle her adversary gave way beneath the sheer weight of the shadows brought to bear against them, the frightened seasonal staggering backwards with a cry as she abruptly found herself without any means of defence. She turned and fled, calling the Wind to her aid as she took to the air, but with a callous laugh that sent shivers running up North's spine Pitch raised his hand to deliver the final blow. He just as swiftly abandoned the motion as a black shaft slit its way through his palm, jerking his hand back in both shock and pain. Despite this, the dark spirit did not hesitate to tug the bolt free, tossing it aside with a sneer as he whirled on the one who had dared fire upon him.

"Did you not learn your lesson the last time, _archer_?" he growled in anger.

Eros' response was to loose another arrow, the bolt flying true despite the slight glow emanating from his bow which showed where the weapon had been damaged. Pitch hastily dematerialized to avoid earning himself another puncture hole, and reappeared with predictive malevolence directly behind his enemy. Eros leapt and rolled to the side just in time to avoid being flattened like an insect, his trajectory taking him close enough to the Guardians to cast a reproving glance over his shoulder as he shouted, "You guys can join in any time!"

A sharp flutter of wings told North that Tooth had decided to show herself, slamming into Pitch with all the strength her diminutive form could muster, and, as the Nightmare King stumbled back, off balance, the Christmas Guardian spun to his Easter comrade.

"_Now_, Bunny!"

In a lightning quick movement, Bunny tapped a paw to the ground twice, and, before Pitch had time to recover from Tooth's surprise attack, a hole swirled into being beneath his feet. With almost ridiculous ease, the Nightmare King tumbled down the pit, the opening sealing above him and leaving those who had been fighting a moment before standing still in tense watchfulness.

"Nice," Eros prompted, nudging the closed hole with his foot. "Where did you send him?"

"On a wild egg hunt," Bunny answered with a smirk that swiftly faded. "You alright?"

"Eh, I've had worse dates," the Valentine spirit quipped. The Guardians stared at him in collective, mute horror, and, with an exasperated roll of his eyes, he amended, "Kidding, I was kidding!"

Bunny snorted. "You haven't gotten any less outrageous with time."

"Hey, you know me," he began, ignoring Bunny's mutter of 'unfortunately'. "I'm a black heart."

"Enough chit chat," North interceded impatiently. "Pitch will not be gone long." He held out his hand to Jack and, after staring at it in confusion a few moments, the winter spirit flushed slightly, his hand going into his pocket to retrieve the misplaced snowglobe. North gave him a stern glance as he took the item, but didn't have time for a full blown lecture as a distinct rumble from the direction of the lake let him know Pitch had found his way back. Whispering a hushed destination to the magical object he cast it to the ground and waited for the portal to burst open in a flash of light before turning to Jack.

"You go now."

Jack took a hesitant step forward, but then stopped, frowning. "What about you guys?"

"Pitch's Fearlings can't be allowed to escape," Tooth explained simply. "We need to contain them."

"But there are too many!" Jack protested. "And..."

"And you aren't helping by sticking around," Eros cut in bluntly, all traces of levity long departed. "You heard Pitch; you're his source of power, and the closer you are to this fight the stronger he'll be. It's time to take a hike, kid."

North joined both Bunny and Tooth in flashing a glare at the Valentine spirit, though it could hardly be said his point was invalid. Jack, however, still looked torn, and North was about to reassure him that they would be fine when the soft rumble behind him became a roaring boom. Whirling in alarm he stared, aghast, at the sheer wall of Fearlings now blotting out the horizon, and the sight of his companions fleeing before them.

"What is _he_ still doing here?" Chuck demanded breathlessly as he raced to join them. Not waiting for an answer he turned to his two bedraggled charges. "You two both go, now!"

"We can still fight!" Mara declared adamantly, jerking her head up in a show of defiance.

"Get through that portal before I throw you through it myself!" Chuck retorted, unmoving, and after a brief, heated moment of tension, Mara obeyed.

"Be careful, Chuck," Aur told the Watcher of the Seasons softly, before following in her sister's wake.

Jack still hesitated, his eyes flitting between the encroaching danger and his fellow Guardians.

"We'll be fine, Jack," Tooth reassured him quickly.

Jack turned back to the portal, taking a slow step forward, before hesitating again as he shook his head. Whatever protest he intended to voice the Guardians would never known, for he was given no chance to speak.

"Oh, for the love of…_go_!" Eros punctuated that one word by planting his foot in the middle of Jack's back and _forcing_ him to stumble forward through the portal. It closed the moment he was beyond the threshold, and the remaining spirits turned back to the wave of Fearlings bearing down upon them from all sides at speed.

"Well, guys," Eros drew an arrow from his quiver and set it to his reforged string. "It was nice knowing you while it lasted."

"We are not done yet," North retorted, shifting the weight of his blades in his hands as he turned with the others to face the oncoming tide.

"Maybe…" the Groundhog said slowly, staring incredulously at what was surely their doom. "But we're about to be."


	24. Chapter 23-I Believe

**A/N: So, are you guys spoilt or what? XD**

**This chapter is fairly short, mostly because the events contained herein are stand alone. This chapter's structure wouldn't work with another scene attached, I don't think, as it would draw away from the important of THIS scene.**

**Enjoy the none lethal cliffhanger. :-)**

**Read, review, and enjoy.**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 23**

**-I ****_Believe_****-**

Jack heard the sharp hiss of the portal sealing behind him. Heard it like the last words his sister had ever spoken to him. Like the end of his life and three hundred years of solitude. Like losing his family all over again. He whirled, but the act was fruitless, because the portal was closed and the snowglobe that had birthed it now rested in the hands of the Spirit of Summer. The fear that had held him in its unrelenting grip was gone now, but another stole in to take its place. A fear that had nothing to do with Pitch's dark talents, and everything to do with what Jack now realized, with more clarity than ever before, he still had to lose.

"They will be alright for a little while," Mara told him, stiffly and factually, as though the very concept of speaking with him was difficult for her. Aur was watching her sister with a slightly wary gaze, so Jack knew he was not imagining that slight hostility. "If you wish to help them, you will need more of a plan than what foolishness is currently running through your mind."

"Mara…" Aur began reprovingly, but her sister quieted her by simply raising her hand.

"No," she said firmly. "He needs to understand."

Aur hesitated briefly, her mismatched gaze flitting between Jack and Mara, before she conceded with a slight nod. Having waited for that permission from the Spirit of Autumn, Mara then turned back to Jack.

"The Fearlings you created will be stronger the closer you are to them, for you fear them, and you fear Pitch. Walking back into that battle now would not help the Guardians or any of those who have chosen to defend you. You would simply see to it that they Faded more swiftly."

"So what, then?" Jack demanded frantically, his own incapability to help in the battle forgotten and buried beneath the overwhelming desire _not _to lose another family. "You expect me to do nothing?"

"Of course not," Mara said sharply. "I expect you to listen, to learn, and then to act. Are you capable of any of these, or do you suffer from the same blind arrogance as your predecessor?"

Jack swallowed, reminded again of what legacy the last Spirit of Winter had left for him to carry. Meeting Mara's gaze as steadily as he could manage when the seasonal was making no effort to hide her disdain, he replied, "I'll listen."

"You had better." Mara gave one, last warning. "The Fearlings Pitch has created found their source in your fear, but they are self sustaining now, and they will not simply dissolve because you are not there. They are no creation of Pitch's, but instead an embodiment of the evil that inhabits his heart. The Guardians destroyed their forms during the Winter War, but, through Pitch and through you, they have found a way to return to an existence that is more than just possessing their host. They are at their strongest now, but what allowed them that strength can also be what undermines them."

"You mean me," Jack guessed, and the slight curve of Mara's lips that could have been a smile was, without a doubt, a gesture of approval.

"I mean exactly that." She nodded. "When Pitch destroyed your talisman, he left a void in its place, a loose connection that was seeking the other half of its missing whole. Pitch took advantage of that. He linked the two of you, and, through that bond, he has been able to create the fear he needed without needing to be near you. You must have felt that connection during the battle. A fear that was more than terror."

Jack nodded mutely, and Mara continued.

"There is only one way to break that connection, to destroy his power at its source, and I believe you know what it is."

"My staff…" Jack frowned, perplexed and not a little downhearted. "But I already tried to fix it, and I couldn't."

"With a piece utterly destroyed?" Mara said. "No seasonal could. But you are not a seasonal, Jack Frost. You are not even a normal spirit anymore. You are a Guardian, and you need to start looking for strength, not in yourself or in your staff, but where a Guardian would seek to find it."

"I don't understand." And he didn't, though he tried to make sense of her words.

"Not all answers come from the places you would expect," Aur repeated softly. "Turn around, Jackson."

No less confused, Jack nonetheless obeyed, turning slowly and, for the first time, taking notice of his surroundings. He was standing in a familiar street, facing a row of equally familiar houses, but his eyes were drawn to just one. A home he had visited time and time again even before he had earned his first believer and the title of Guardian he now bore, above the gate of which hovered a tiny, anxious little being, watching him with eyes that were both worried and kind.

Panic overtook him, and he swiftly started to back away.

"I…I can't!" he protested, when Mara's hand hit his back like a burning brand, forcing him forward again. "I could…I could _hurt_ them."

"You have held yourself in check thus far," Mara retorted. "A few more moments will not make a difference." Her pause was but preparation, for her next words were almost a physical blow. "I thought you wanted to help your friends?"

It was a cruel statement, meant to trap him, and it did so effortlessly. The Guardians were all in trouble _because_ of him. Because of what he had and had not done. But could he justify putting Jamie in danger again to try and save them? It was an impossible decision, and yet another choice he could not make.

"You will not harm the children," Aur said suddenly, her tone absolute. "Not with Mara here. Her powers contain yours, and we will not stray far."

Jack turned to her, trusting her far more than he did her sister. "You can promise me that?"

Aur responded without hesitation, "You have my word."

It was still not enough, not by a long shot, but Mara's silent disapproval and impatience combined told him quite clearly that, if he did not make a decision soon, the choice would be taken from him. Summoning what strength he had left, he stamped down on the panic trying to convince him to turn and flee, banishing it to the back corners of his mind, walled in by the remembrance that, even at this distance, he could unwittingly aid Pitch. Sucking in a sharp breath he took a slow step forward, then another, forcing himself to cross the distance between himself and Baby Tooth.

The tiny fairy greeted him gladly, beckoning him to follow after her. With one, final glance at the waiting seasonals, Jack vaulted over the fence to land in the Bennetts' backyard. Baby Tooth fluttered on ahead, leading him straight towards Jamie's open bedroom window, though she did not fly through the open entrance, motioning for him to go first. It took more courage than Jack would have thought possible to approach the window, and a further push from Baby Tooth to get him to hop through, landing almost silently on the wooden floor of the room beyond.

Almost, because Jamie somehow contrived to still hear him.

"Jack!" Throwing back the cover on his bed, Jamie leapt upright, then paused still standing on his bed, clearly rethinking his actions the moment he saw Jack unwittingly flinch. Cursing himself for that reaction, because it had given away far more than he had really wanted to, Jack forced himself to move closer, whilst still keeping a healthy distance between himself and the young boy.

"Hi, Jamie." It was difficult to speak around the lump in his throat as he recalled the fact he had, only a few hours before, believed that he would never set eyes on this little believer again. "You okay?"

"I'm fine." Jamie was quick to reassure him. "We're both fine." He paused, giving Jack a once over. "You look horrible."

"Thanks." He couldn't help the smile that crept across his face, an involuntary reaction whenever he interacted with his young friend. Jamie did not share the gesture, however, and Jack lowered his gaze as he tried to think of something else to say, his train of thought dissolving entirely as he spotted a familiar, wooden box resting beneath Jamie's bed. "Is that?"

"Your staff?" Jamie finished helpfully. "Yes. Yes, it is."

"Why do you have it?" He was more curious than anything else, though, now that it was so close, he could not help but want to touch the broken item again. He still did not see how Mara expected him to fix it, but she had seemed certain that the answers lay with Jamie, and Jack _wanted_ to believe the same.

"I…I made something for you," Jamie explained quietly, holding out his hand. Being careful not to touch the boy's skin with his own, Jack plucked the item from Jamie's hand and held it up to the bright moonlight streaming in through the open window to study it. The soft gasp of astonishment that left his lips then was entirely involuntary, and he turned to the anxiously waiting child in astonishment.

"You made this?"

"Yeah," Jamie nodded eagerly. "They're teaching us wood carving at school, and I thought if you had a piece that fit..."

It was a beautiful gesture, and Jack felt terrible for crushing the boy's hopes.

"It doesn't work like that, Jamie," he explained. "It has to be the original piece."

"How do you know that?" Jamie pressed. "You haven't even tried."

Jack had to admit that much, and he knew Jamie wasn't likely to let the subject drop unless he at least made one attempt.

"Alright," he said. "Alright, I'll try, but you have to be prepared for the fact this probably won't work."

Jamie nodded, diving from the bed retrieve the wooden chest hidden beneath. Together they laid out the pieces in the correct order, fitting them neatly into one another like the parts of a puzzle, Jamie's additional shard slipping perfectly into place. The wood was not the same, a paler hue that stood out against the darker color of the staff, but Jamie had clearly worked hard to make sure his replacement was as near a perfect replica for the missing shard as possible. Once the pieces of the staff were set, Jack let his hand hover over the cracked shards, closing his eyes and focusing on melding the separate pieces together. He did not need to see what he was doing to know the fragments were slotting together piece by piece. He could _feel_ them. Could sense the bindings tugging them together. There was no resistance to his efforts, and for a few precious seconds he dared to hope this might actually _work_.

Then, with a suddenness that left his mind ringing from the sharp snap, the connection broke, and he fell back on his heels, fighting to regulate his breathing. When he was certain his voice would not betray any hint of weakness, he lifted his head to meet Jamie's concerned gaze.

"See," he said, disappointed. "It doesn't work."

"Maybe you just aren't believing hard enough," Jamie argued with sincerity. "You're always telling me that so long as I believe enough in something it'll come true. Maybe you just need to do the same."

"Jamie..." Jack began.

"Please," Jamie insisted, cutting him off. "Try again."

Jack was fairly certain he had taken about as much disappointment as he could handle, but he owed it to Jamie—and the Guardians still fighting elsewhere due to _his _mistakes—to try, so he swallowed back his own reluctance, settling into place again and letting his fingers rest lightly against the wooden shards as he closed his eyes, beginning the process all over again. Again he felt the pieces tugged towards one another, like a broken bone swiftly binding itself into a whole once more, and he braced himself for the coming severance as he felt the approach of the foreign shard. He felt the connection begin to rive, then something warm landed atop his hand, and, in a breathtaking surge of energy, the bond between Jack and his talisman was renewed.

Jack's eyes flashed open in shock, just in time to witness the final stages of his staff's renewal, the brilliant, blue glow fading away to reveal Jamie's broad grin, the young boy withdrawing his hand from where it had been covering Jack's own with a whoop of joy.

"Yeah! We _did _it!" Leaping to his feet Jamie threw his hands up into the air in triumph. "It's fixed! It's fixed! That means you can stay, right?"

Jack opened his mouth, but shut it again without making a sound, shock immobilizing him as he grasped his rejuvenated staff tightly in one hand, the other traveling to rest against his chest, where he could once again, at long, _long _last, feel the warm, gentle hum of his weapon. His grounding anchor. His powers were no longer ripping and tearing at his insides, carefully contained in a wooden box that would release them as he willed, his frost swirls already decorating the handle of his rod where his fingers touched it. And that shadows were gone. The shadows that had lingered at the edge of his thougths for so _long _he had thought he would never be rid of them.

Letting loose a wild, exhilarated laugh of relief, Jack let his staff clatter to the floor in favor of scooping Jamie up in his arms, all but smothering the small boy in a tight embrace before dropping him squarely back on his feet.

"Is that a yes?" Jamie demanded, bouncing slightly in place as he watched Jack retrieve the shepherd's crook.

"That's a yes, Jamie," Jack replied softly, still overwhelmed as he ran a hand wonderingly down the repaired surface of his weapon. There was no sign at all that it had ever been shattered. No sign save for the single, lighter segment that stood out against the darker wood. Jamie's piece. Crouching down so as to be on eye level with the child, he placed a hand on Jamie's shoulder, mustering every ounce of sincerity within him.

"_Thank you_, Jamie. I owe you one. A really, _really _big one." Eyes sparkling with mirth, he added with a mischievous smile, "But, right now, I owe Pitch more"

Jamie squared his shoulders, his voice and face deadly serious as he said, "Go kick his tail, Jack,"

Jack's smile turned into a full-blown smirk.

"You got it."


	25. Chapter 24-Let It Snow

**A/N: This chapter is not my best work, largely due to the fact I am fairly far from well at the moment. It is a gift of my immune system that I can suffer through the flu relatively unscathed, but give me a common house cold and I'm all but dying for several days. Go figure.**

**On a more positive note, I now have a proper job, over thirty hours a week with decent pay. Whoot! Of course, this may impact negatively on my writing time, so this is a slight heads up to my reviewers/readers that updates may get a little slow...er.**

**Also, I cannot write extended fight scenes, so I borrowed a little trick from HTTYD to cover my inability. You'll know it when you see it.**

**Oh, and one last thing. Um...I'm sorry?**

**Read, review, enjoy, and try not to give into the urge to murder the author.**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 24**

**-Let It Snow-**

Pitch had almost forgotten what it felt like.

The exhilarating taste of complete and total victory. He had come close before. Oh, so _breathtakingly_ close, with just a tantalizing flicker of what a true sip from the golden cup of blessed triumph tasted like all but drowning him in its potency. He had come close, only to have what he so desired torn from his hands at the very last moment. Now, though, _now_ he remembered, and he reveled, and he triumphed. What hope did the world have now? What hope, when the Guardians lay broken at his feet alongside their allies, and his army swelled and surged about him to the beat of victory?

The answer was none.

None at all.

He stepped out onto the ice slowly, the Fearlings parting to allow him passage, drawing back from the Guardians they had beaten to the very ground. Why none of them had chosen to call their armies was beyond him, but he cared not for what madness had made them believe they would be able to match him in strength without any aid. What did it matter, in the end? They had been wrong, they had been defeated, and the signs of the taint he would eventually irreversibly sow in each and every one of them were already showing, the dark tendrils reaching along their limbs and intertwining with their very beings.

"There is no point in fighting it." He came to a halt beside North, watching with an amused smile as the big man tried to rise, and failed utterly. "It will take you all in the end, and you will serve _me_."

"Have you never heard the term 'pride comes before a fall'?"

Pitch turned, not bothering to muster a glower for the truly tenacious archer, who had made it to his knees, though all his companions lay prone. This one held an advantage over the others, however, for the emotion he commanded was easily one of the greater powers on the 'good' side of the spectrum, ranking right alongside belief. _Love_. Pitch felt his lip curl at the very thought, and it was an act of impulse that drove him to summon his scythe, the weapon cutting through the air as he bashed the blunt end against the Valentine spirit's back, knocking him flat on his face, and bringing his heel down hard on Eros' predominant hand. The Valentine Spirit squirmed, wrenching his crushed limb free, but did not give Pitch the satisfaction of uttering a sound.

"_Kneel_," he hissed venomously.

Rebellion burning in coal black eyes, Eros pushed himself to his knees again. "I don't kneel for beings such as you," he answered firmly. "Never again." With a monumental effort he hauled himself to his feet, standing with his legs spread apart in a stance that allowed his shaking limbs to hold him. "So I guess you'll just have to _make_ me."

"No, Eros! _Don't_!"

Tooth's voice cried out in warning, but Pitch ignored her, and the other voices that added themselves to the chorus of cautions. Instead he took a slow, menacing step forward, enjoying the way his height advantage meant the Spirit of Love had to twist his head to hold the dark spirit's gaze. But Eros didn't back down, holding his ground with the misguided determination of any fool deluded by the grandeur of heroism. This was most certainly one who would not be easily subdued.

He did love a challenge.

Calling his Fearlings to himself he let them bolster his strength, feeling his physical form grow as their very essence merged with his own. His arms snaked out, seizing the archer by the shoulders, but his eyes stared beyond the defiant face before him and to the warm glow of the wholesome heart that dwelt within. A golden heart. A heart filled with love. A heart he meant to corrupt, utterly and completely.

With all his concentration, he brought his shadows to bear upon that bright glow, smothering it utterly. His physical hold on his prey allowed him to feel the moment when the archer's defenses snapped into place, when his shoulders tensed for a fight, but there was nothing a show of strength could do against an assault such as this. He allowed the darkness to batter relentlessly on the invisible shield protecting that glow from being extinguished, applying more and more force, until every fiber of his being was focused on the task. Eros crumpled before him, driven to his knees as he gasped with exertion, but his light did not waver, flickering with the same irritating tenacity as its holder so often displayed. This one was still too strong for him to conquer, but that was a hurdle easily surmounted.

Summoning his scythe again he took a step back, letting the point of the weapon tap against the archer's chest, before drawing it over his shoulder for the swing. He made his movements deliberately slow, well aware his victim could not move, and that the similarly prone Guardians could do nothing but watch. He would destroy this one first, before their very eyes, so that they would know what fate awaited them, and then he would Turn them all. One after another, until everyone who had once been an enemy stood alongside him and the Man in the Moon would be able to do nothing but watch.

He waited until Eros raised his head, until their gazes met, and then he swung his weapon. A fierce shriek echoed the movement, as of an object traveling too fast for the eye to track, and the scythe's blade found its home in hard wood, blazing, blue eyes staring darkly into Pitch's own as the one wielding the staff thrust his blow aside with a single push.

The Nightmare King staggered back in shock, staring aghast at the sight now filling all his vision. Jack Frost stood before him, his spine straight, his shoulders set, and his face shining with a fierce determination where once only fear had been visible. His staff, his _staff_ rested loosely in his hand, pointed towards the ground, sparking with life as frost patterns rippled up and down its surface. Jack himself was all but glowing, all the power he had accumulated without the staff to control it still within him, and now _completely_ under his command.

Pitch could feel the ground spiraling away beneath him, his victory ripped from him once more, and for one, panic stricken moment that was all he could think of. He was going to lose. After all his planning, all his _months_ of hard work and deceit and cowering in the shadows…After everything, _this_ was how it would end? His rightful power stripped from him a second time by the one spirit who should have been standing on _his_ side? There was a terrible, crushing feeling in his chest, as if North's full weight had come bearing down upon him, and in that moment Pitch could not _think_. His mind, his greatest asset, abandoned him utterly, and he could do nothing but stare mutely at his nemesis, at the spirit he had brought so very low only to see him rise to _this_ from the ashes.

But _failure_ was not acceptable, the voices that burned always at the back of his mind reminded him, and, with a sudden burst of wrenching anger, Pitch hauled himself from the agony of vanquishment to the blazing fury of retribution. He still had his army, the Guardians could not help, and Jack stood alone.

So be it.

He would fall alone as well.

* * *

Jack was not angry, or upset, or even afraid. He expected he should have been feeling all, or at least one of, those things, but instead he was simply calm. He knew what he was doing, what he had done, and what he had yet to _do_. He had not panicked when he saw Pitch trying to destroy Eros, because he had known he could make it in time. He had not been afraid when he saw the Guardians lying defeated, because he knew the only reason they had not summoned their full strength was because they knew he would come to their aid. He knew he could defeat Pitch no matter how many Fearlings the dark spirit had summoned. He knew because Jamie knew, because Jamie believed, and so Jack believed too.

He stood between Pitch and his prey with absolute surety, his hold on his staff relaxed, and his own pose deceptively mimicking that lack of tension. He had made his move, and the next step in this game was Pitch's to make. He watched the emotions flicker across his enemy's face. Shock. Defeat. Disbelief. Despair—oh, yes, he _knew_ that one. And then anger; raw, unbridled fury that turned Pitch's face into a mask of arrant wrath.

Jack watched passively as Pitch took three steps back, raising his arms as he called all his Fearlings to him, the black shapes seeping away from the Guardians and back to their host's feet. There they pooled, until Pitch was standing on a black disk of churning darkness that resembled a pit of boiling tar. That same disk slowly reduced in size as Pitch grew and grew and grew until the shadow he cast over Jack easily blotted out the moon trying to peer through the thick clouds above. Jack met the amber, rage filled stare of his enemy for a brief second, then he smirked.

Pitch's blow would have crushed both him and Eros had Jack not seen it coming, sliding sideways across the ice and dragging Eros with him, returning the favor he had owed after his purely shameful performance during his last encounter with Pitch. He did not remain beside the Valentine spirit for long, however, using the ice to catapult himself forward, Pitch in hot pursuit, before calling out to the Wind with that part of himself that had been missing for so long and taking to the air. Pitch followed him, as Jack had known he would, all logic lost beneath the desire to destroy whatever stood in his path. With brute force, if need be. Pitch did not stop to think that Jack had the advantage in the air. That the dark clouds into which the winter spirit was darting were his own creation. And he certainly didn't stop to consider that he had just flown right into the heart of the storm.

Jack didn't give him time to realize his mistake, floating to the very center of the cloud mass, then reaching inside of himself, and pulling on the power that had amassed there ever since Pitch shattered his staff. The energy crackled through his limbs and along his fingertips, dancing up and down his staff, and surging through his whole body as he took a deep breath, then released it all.

* * *

"He did it," North breathed as he found his feet, his gaze fixed on the heavens even as he fought to regain his equilibrium. "Jamie did it!"

Beside him, Bunny made a choked sound that was either a laugh of relief or an attempt to express too many emotions at once. North felt much the same, watching the flashes of blue that suddenly began to pepper the black clouds above them. The fight now taking place was beyond their line of sight, but so long as that light still shone, North chose to believe that Jack was winning. That boy didn't have it in him to lose. Not when it counted.

"Shouldn't we help?" Tooth asked anxiously, switching between hovering at their side and resting on the ice, a sure sign she was not yet fully recovered. "I mean, did you guys _see_ Pitch?"

"No," Bunny said firmly, and all three of his fellow Guardians turned to look at him in astonishment. "This is Jack's fight," the Easter Guardian elaborated, bending to help an alarmingly pale-faced Eros to his feet. Sandy was doing the same for the Groundhog, though the small creature seemed put out by the fact the Guardian of Dreams had considered it necessary. Perhaps more so by the fact Sandy was _right_. It was a reminder, North thought somberly, considering his own swiftly returning strength, of what a difference having believers made, even with all the weaknesses that came with such an advantage. "We have to let him finish this."

"What if he can't?" Tooth questioned, her face worried. "I have faith in Jack, Bunny, I _do_, but Pitch hasn't been this powerful since…since the Dark Ages! And look what he did then!"

"We can't interfere," Bunny insisted. "Those are Jack's fears up there. His insecurities. His memories. He has to beat them himself, or defeating Pitch won't mean anything at all."

What Bunny said was true, North was forced to admit, but that didn't make it any easier to stand by and do nothing. Although, his sleigh was long since gone, so, even had he not agreed with Bunny against his better judgment, most of them had no means of getting airborne regardless.

"We need to get off this ice," Chuck said suddenly, a wary eye on the horizon. "I don't know about you guys, but I have a feeling I'm not gonna want to be on this lake when those two get serious."

"_Get_ serious?" North cast another glance at the invisible fight going on above him, then returned his stare to the Groundhog even as the motley crew began to edge their way off the center of the lake.

"You've fought a seasonal before yourselves," the Groundhog reminded him pointedly. "Do you _really_ think that's all the weight your little whippersnapper has to throw about?" North had no answer to that, and, seeing this, the Guardian of the Seasons gave a sharp nod. "Your boy's just waiting for us to get clear, I'll bet," he said. "Once we do, all hell is going to break loose."

* * *

Jack was tearing Pitch apart one fear fueled memory at a time. The Nightmare King was throwing images at him one after the other in quick succession. The same memories he had used to cow Jack both in his lair and in that disaster's aftermath. But Pitch no longer had the string to pull that had made their influence all the more devastating, and Jack could finally, actually _see_.

He came face to face with Bunny's hostility, his doubt, his anger, and his distrust, and he brushed it all aside with the memory of the fact it had been _Bunny_ who came for him in that snowy wasteland. That Bunny was the one who had found him in Pitch's lair and who had brought him back. That Bunny was the older brother he had never had and loved to annoy and he _wasn't_ letting Pitch take that away from him.

He crashed against the accusation of his nightmares, of Tooth holding his memories from him on purpose, a dark glint to her eyes as she hid them away. He slashed through that image, replacing it with the kindness on her face and in her voice as she laid a hand on his shoulder and told him how if she had only known of this missing piece of himself she would have gladly helped him find it.

Pitch thrust Sandy's death in his face, with the determined mantra of '_your' fault_ at its back, and Jack batted it away with the reminder that _he_ had been the one to reawaken the belief in children. That it had been his words and actions that had allowed Sandy to come back.

North's condemning '_you were with _Pitch?' washed over him like the damp mist of a storm-cloud, and he let it, replacing its chill touch with the warmth in the big Guardian's eyes as he laid a hand on Jack's shoulder and told him he firmly believed he could never turn into something as dark and twisted as Pitch had become.

'_No one would have noticed_…' collided with the sight of the seasonals and their watcher closing ranks around him, and the soft reassurance in the eyes of a spirit he had only just met as Eros took his arm and did his utmost to keep him from harm.

'You _did this_…' and the dreadful, dreadful image that went with it was utterly obliterated by Jamie's trusting expression, and the warm hand that had so selflessly touched his own despite the risks.

Pitch was shrinking before his eyes as each of his Fearlings was confronted, defeated, and destroyed, and so the Nightmare King drew on the darker memories. On the deepest and vilest nightmares his powers could conjure. Jack faced them head on, crashing into the dark illusion of his sister's grief following his death, and wielding his own, reaffirmed convictions against the power of Pitch's shadows.

_He_ had made the decision to save his sister. That hadn't been Pitch's doing, it had been _his_ choice. If she had suffered for that he was sorry, but, given the chance, he would do exactly the same thing again, because she was better off alive and grieving with the chance of healing than she was at the bottom of those icy waters, her young life cut so cruelly short. He was her older brother, and he had sworn always to protect her, and he _had_. So he let that memory glide past him, whispering an apology to her tear streaked face, yet knowing whatever grief she had felt had surely passed eventually. Pitch had been defeated, he could not have haunted one little girl as long as he claimed he had, for he had been battling the Guardians fiercely at that time.

Pitch had lied.

Jack had saved his sister.

And he was _proud_ of it.

The last Fearling was stripped away, and Jack finally faced just his enemy, his staff still crackling in his hands as he faced Pitch squarely across the swirling mass of storm clouds raining snow on the lake below. The Nightmare King appeared undaunted by the slow whittling away of his army, still enlarged, though to a lesser degree, by the shadows he had absorbed. Still too consumed by anger to even consider reason. Jack braced himself, waiting for the taunting comments that were sure to come, but was taken wholly by surprise when Pitch chose to launch himself forward instead, dark tendrils snapping through the air in an attempt to seize their prey. Jack dodged deftly, the Wind at his back, guiding him to safety even when he was not sure which way was up and which was down. Pitch was not at all dissuaded by Jack's ability to evade him, and the attacks continued one after another, even when he used the clouds for cover.

Spinning along the bottom of the cloudbank, Jack's eyes traced the surface of the lake, confirming the fact his distraction had allowed the others to get to relative safety. Once certain that the Guardians and those who had helped them were no longer in the line of fire he darted back up through the clouds, twirling as he exited their misty substance and leaving a curled trail in his wake. His trajectory had brought him right in front of Pitch, and blue eyes met amber in a searing collision of color.

"Now, it's _my _turn," he said levelly. "Let's revisit the past, shall we?"

He seized a hold of the Nightmare King, pushing Pitch right _through_ the cloud of Nightmare Sand on which he was floating and driving them both towards the frozen lake below. The Wind whirled around him, snow on its back that created a funnel for them to fall through, and which drove back the dark tendrils of shadow that tried to seize a hold of him as they fell. There was nothing to impede their path as they raced towards the frozen water below, and their impact drove them right through the thick layer of ice, cracked shards swirling through the water around them as they sunk towards the bottom. The water was pitch black beneath, only the bright glow of Jack's staff illuminating the darkness, and Pitch's very form all but invisible in the gloom.

Jack released his adversary as soon as his feet touched the bottom, tightening his grip on his staff as he surged for the surface, freezing the water as he went, his eyes fixed on the moon breaking through the cloud cover above. He had almost made it to the top, the liquid freezing all around him so that for a moment he was half afraid it would solidify faster than he could outrun it, but a moment later his head broke the surface, and he had just enough time to let out a whoop of triumph before a vice closed about his ankle and hauled him back below, the ice closing with fatal finality above his head.


	26. Chapter 25-Ice

**A/N: So there are a couple of things I want to say here, though nothing overly important to the chapter itself, so feel free to read that first then come back here.**

**Those of you who have read the books might have a clue as to what is going on in the third point-of-view of this chapter, but I'm not giving anything away, and you shouldn't have too long to wait for the next chapter regardless, as it is already all but written. It just needs tweaking and editing, so I should have it up within the next few days. There will either be one or two more chapters and then a short epilogue before this story wraps up. So, yeah, not far to go now.**

**On that note, I want to tell you guys something I've been planning ever since the review count on this story far exceeded my expectations. I have said it before and I will say it again; the response to this fic has been truly phenomenal, and I've been utterly blown away by how many positive things people have had to say about this story, my characterization, my style, and even the OCs I threw at you all with so little warning. It's been a genuine pleasure sharing my work with you all, and having the chance to converse with some of you in more than just the briefest terms. On that note, and with the review counter up there now showing a number of over seven hundred, I would like thank all my reviewers, and I have a little surprise in store for you all.**

**I am offering to write a one-shot, drabble, alternative ending to a chapter, elaboration on a scene, or anything each individual wants for anyone who has read _and_ reviewed this fic, even the Guest reviewers (who will just have to let me know which review was yours if you want to make a request). Each reviewer will be allowed one story request each, and the only rules are that I don't write slash, I don't write anything M rated, and you can ask for romance but I'm not going to guarantee it will be any good. All story requests will be posted under a one-shot series I'm going to call 'Snowfall', which will act as a companion to Blizzard, and may, if I'm brave enough, end up containing a few stories relevant to the back stories of my OCs. The only exception to the 'one fic' rule will be for those of you who have also drawn fanart for me especially for this story. That deserves an extra reward, I think, and you will be allowed to request one story per work of art on top of the one your reviews have brought you. Sound fair?**

**I would just ask that you all hold off making your requests until after the story is finished, just in case subsequent chapters make you want something you wouldn't know you wanted until the chapter was posted, if that makes sense. ;-)**

**This is my way of thanking you guys for all the lovely support you have offered me along the road. It's been a long and angsty one, but well worth the trip, and it's been a blast having you along for the ride.**

**Read, Review, and Enjoy!**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**EDIT: This chapter has been revised since first posting. The first section has been extended.  
**

**CHAPTER 25**

**-Ice-**

The ground shook with a great, crackling boom as the entire lake suddenly seemed to surge. The ice that covered it surface rippled from one end to another, like a wave crashing against the shore, bright, blue veins of light spreading across its surface before it fell flat and still again. The wind quieted, the blizzard faded, and the world was silent.

Bunny stood alongside his fellow spirits, his breath catching in his throat as he watched the ice, the air, even the forest for any sign of either Jack or Pitch or even a Fearling. Anything that would give him some clue as to what had just happened. But there was nothing. Nothing save for the sparse, softly drifting snowflakes that continued to fall from above in twirling, curling paths of frivolity. The sudden quiet was peaceful, without the oppressive feel Pitch's darkness usually brought with it, but Bunny could not find it within himself to relax just yet. The blizzard Jack had conjured had prevented them from seeing most of the fight, and now that it had eased there was no visible sign to enlighten them. Jack and Pitch were simply _gone_, and Bunny dreaded what that might mean.

"Jack?" Tooth's voice broke the silence first as the fairy flitted forward, her wings buzzing as she gained a little height in the hopes a better vantage point would allow her to see what was not there. "Jack, where are you?"

There was no answer save for the soft, mournful howl of the breeze darting in and out between the tree trunks, and Bunny exhaled a long, steadying breath that left a cloud of steam hanging in the air before his face.

"They cannot have gone far," North reasoned, bracing his shoulders as he stepped back out onto the lake and turned in a slow circle. "We would have seen storm shift."

Sandy nodded eager agreement, conjuring a cloud of golden sand that carried him up into the sky above. Tendrils of sand drifted all across the overcast sky, breaking through the pre-dawn darkness, but they illuminated nothing but empty space, and Sandy returned to solid ground with a bewildered shrug of his shoulders.

"Guys," Eros' voice was quiet, subdued, his eyes fixated on something that lay beyond any sight but his own keen vision. "Look."

The Guardians turned, but could not behold what the archer had. Not, at least, until the clouds above them parted, and a single moonbeam pierced through the shroud they had formed to shine on an object resting on the very top of the lake. An object that was all too familiar. Bunny didn't stop to think, breaking into a run as he raced across the surface of the ice, slipping and sliding to a halt as he seized the staff and stared all around in an effort to locate its owner. Tooth joined him a moment later, and almost scared him out of his wits when she gave a half-choked scream, her hands flying to her mouth as she gazed downwards through the frozen, crystal clear water. Bunny's own head turned to follow her line of sight, and his heart sank to somewhere near the soles of his paws.

"No," he groaned, crashing to his knees. "No, no, _no…"_

North and Sandy were beside them both in a moment, and the four of them looked down through the transparent ice in collective horror. There, mere feet beneath the surface, was their missing Guardian, enclosed by his own gift on all sides so that he lay perfectly aligned as if resting on a bed, his eyes closed and his arms limp at his sides. He looked peaceful, unaware of the tendrils of shadow that darkened the ice a short distance from where he had been trapped. Unaware of anything at all.

"Jack…" Tooth whispered the word, her hands still covering her mouth, her magenta eyes damp with unshed tears. Bunny waited for her, for _anyone_, to say something else. To explain what lay before his eyes. To give him a way to _fix_ it. But nobody said anything, all of them rendered equally mute by this unexpected twist of fate.

It wasn't fair, he thought bitterly. It wasn't bloody fair.

Something impacted hard against the surface of the lake, rebounding off the frozen water and clattering harmlessly a few inches from Bunny's knee. He glanced briefly at the black shaft lying beside him, then lifted his gaze to Eros, who was already fitting another arrow to the string.

"You won't be able to break it," he found himself saying, or, at least, he thought he did. The voice sounded like his own, but shock made it hard to decide whether he was conjuring the words or they were simply sounding inside his own head. "Jack froze it, and what he freezes doesn't melt until he wants it too."

He had learnt that a long time ago, in a less than pleasant manner, which had afforded the other Guardians a great deal of amusement. He had been furious at Jack for days after the incident, though it seems such a trivial thing now.

Eros, for his part, ignored him, letting a second arrow fly, which ricocheted off the impossibly hard ice and came close to clipping Tooth's wing.

"Eros," the Groundhog began, though a third bolt was loosed before he could finish, skimming across the surface of the lake like a skipping stone. "Eros, _stop_."

"_You_ stop!" the Valentine spirit snapped, turning on the Watcher of the Seasons in anger. "Or are you planning on simply _leaving_ him there?"

"I don't _plan_ on doing anything," Chuck retorted shortly. "But you're not even making a dent in that ice, and I'll wager that nothing else will either." He turned to the Guardians, then, his expression sympathetic. "I can have Mara try to melt it, but…"

"But what?" North demanded, his face almost as pale as his beard. "What you saying?"

"But it probably won't work," the Watcher of the Seasons continued with slow deliberation. "You all saw the power Jack was wielding when he did this… Water frozen like that… it's going to take more than a little summer heat to thaw."

"You mean he's trapped like that?" Tooth asked in horror, exchanging a wide-eyed glance with Sandy. "For how long?"

"Worst case scenario?" Chuck said woodenly. "Forever."

"No!" Bunny protested at once, shaking his head. "No, not an option. There has to be a way to get him out of there. We just… we just need to figure it out."

"Look, Aster," the Groundhog began, and it was clear he was losing his composure. "I don't like this any more than you do. You think I want to see a seasonal trapped like that? I _don't_, believe me, but I also don't know any way to undo something like this without the seasonal responsible reversing the changes themselves."

"And how is Jack supposed to do that without his staff?" Tooth asked, interjecting before Bunny could vent further.

"He can't," the short spirit answered flatly. "That's the problem."

There was silence as the Big Four absorbed the finality of that statement, broken only by the loud clatter of Eros' bow hitting the ice as he threw both it and his quiver down with unnecessary force, then stormed away across the frozen lake. Bunny watched him go, slightly bewildered by the outburst, before his gaze was inevitably drawn back to their sealed friend. Jack was so close, the ice so clear he could almost believe he could simply reach out and touch the winter spirit, but the cold, solid wall that met his paw when he tried showed that illusion for the lie it was.

"He looks like he's sleeping," Tooth susurrated painfully, her own hand pressed against the cruel barrier keeping them from reaching their youngest. "Oh, Jack…"

The Groundhog shuffled his feet slightly, and Bunny's eyes snapped up to meet the beady gaze of the seasonals' guard.

"So that's it, then?" he spoke tightly. "There's nothing you can do?"

"I'm afraid not," the Groundhog spread his hands, and Bunny's temper flared as his mind searched desperately for something, _anything _to strike out against.

"Then what bloody use are you?" The words came out as a growl as he surged to his feet, two steps placing him right before the other spirit over which he so easily towered. "This is all _your_ fault, you know. Watcher of the Seasons, is it? Where was your _watching_ when Mara and Aur were taken? Where were you when Willow was telling Pitch the secrets to destroying her own kind? Where were you when she brought him here to destroy every last one of us?"

"Bunny…" North laid a restraining hand on his shoulder, but the Easter Guardian simply shook it off.

"No!" He threw a glare at their de facto leader. "_No_, I want an answer, because this is the second time we've had to clean up _his_ messes, and I want to know _why_. Why are _we_ the ones always picking up the pieces your charges leave lying in their wake?"

"Bunny," Tooth interjected with the same sharpness she had used when he deliberately brought up Jack's invisibility during his induction. "This isn't helping."

"It's helping _me_," he snarled back, whirling around on the Groundhog before he had even finished pronouncing the last word. "Well? Do you have _any_ excuse at all?"

"_You_ were the ones who killed Seraphina," was the Groundhog's retort, the accusation blatant, and without the slightest hint of doubt. "Was it any wonder Skadi turned on you? And it's hardly my fault you don't keep close enough tabs on your youngster to know when he's in danger. Maybe if you'd actually cared about the little mite in any of his three hundred years none of this would have happened!"

"We weren't the ones that hurt her!" Bunny shouted back, oblivious to Tooth's abortive attempts to make him stop. "That could have just as easily been Pitch. In fact, it most likely _was_ him, so you tell me how Skadi throwing her lot in with Pitch made any more sense than Willow doing exactly the same thing? And don't go preaching to me about _neglect_, you hypocritical snake, because you're the one who let one of your charges use him as a bloody punching bag!"

"At least Willow had the decency to acknowledge his existence," Chuck said nonchalantly. "Which is more than I can say for _you_."

Bunny saw red, and would have flown at the short spirit had North and Tooth not firmly held him back. He fought them, spitting curses in unison with the burrowing creature as Sandy darted back and forth over their heads signing things none of them bothered to look at, and it wasn't until another intruded on their argument that reason was heard again.

"Stop it!" Eros' clear voice easily cut through their argument, and they all turned with comical unity to stare at the Valentine spirit, who had walked back across the ice to stand a short distance away from them. "Stop it," he repeated in a quieter tone, a visible weariness to both his words and his movements as he bent to retrieve his discarded weapons. "You're arguing on what could very well be your friends grave," he told the Guardians, ignoring the impact that choice of words had as he straightened. "As if we haven't already done enough damage to one another."

He didn't wait for a response, whirling on his heel and walking away across the lake to vanish into the snow-laden wood on its borders. The Guardians were left staring awkwardly across a seemingly unfathomable distance at the Watcher of the Seasons.

"I should go," Chuck said at last, breaking the awkward silence. "Mara and Aur… Willow. We're going to need to have a long talk."

Bunny didn't quite trust himself to speak on that matter, so he allowed North to take the lead.

"We will trust you to handle what needs to be done," the Christmas Guardian said with tangible reluctance. "But make sure it never happens again, or we _will_ be taking charge."

"I know how to clean my own house," Chuck said stiffly, ignoring Bunny's mutter of 'you could have fooled me' as he turned and shuffled away to the lake shore, where he quickly opened a burrow with a sharp whistle, diving through the opening and letting it close behind him. The remaining four spirits stood together in a strained silence for several moments, before Sandy created a question mark that floated in a steadily quickening circle around them all.

"I don't know, Sandy, okay?" Bunny sighed at last, raising a paw to drag it down his face. "I don't know what to do."

"We can't just leave him here," Tooth said inanely, even though she doubtlessly knew just as well as the rest of them that they may not have a choice in the matter. Bunny crouched down again, his voice pitched low, though he was certain the other Guardians would still be able to hear him if they strained their ears hard enough.

"Come on, Frosty," he all but begged. "One more miracle. Just one more."

He waited with baited breath, his heart beating rapidly in his chest, but Jack did not move, the ice didn't crack, and there was no sign the winter spirit could even hear him. Whatever Jack had done to keep Pitch contained seemed to have just as easily entrapped him, and Bunny was reminded of the story of Nightlight, and the first time Pitch's wild rampage across the Universe had been brought to a halt. How many centuries had their spectral friend spent locked away in the darkness to keep the Nightmare King contained? Nobody knew for certain, and the thought of Jack spending an equally indeterminate amount of time sealed with their enemy was nigh on unbearable.

"How…" North began, then aborted the sentence, his hands clutching the staff Bunny had dropped when he first caught sight of Jack trapped in the ice. "How are we going to tell Jamie?"

How indeed? Bunny wondered, and wondered, and could not come up with any way to break such news gently. That boy adored Jack, as did most of the children who had ever come in contact with him, and to have to tell them, _any _of them, what had happened here…

"He should have this," North added, cradling the staff in both hands. "He was one to fix it and… he should have way to remember, just in case."

"Wait, _wait_…" Tooth forcibly interjected, placing herself right in front of North. "What are you doing? Jack's just trapped, he's not… he's not _gone_."

"Tooth," Bunny replied solemnly. "This is hard for all of us, but you saw how tough that ice is and you heard what Chuck said. There ain't anything that can break it."

"How do you know that?" Tooth challenged. "How do _any_ of you know that? Why are we giving up on him so easily? Why are we letting Pitch win?"

"In case you didn't notice, he already _has_ won." Bunny's temper was getting the better of him again, but he did his best to rein it in, knowing full well that growing angry at his fellow Guardians would get him nowhere. "Or do you consider it a victory to have Jack sealed away with the Boogeyman?"

"That, right there, is Pitch winning," the Guardian of Memories declared, pointing a finger at her comrade. "That is Pitch stealing hope from the very one who guards it." She swung on North just as vehemently. "That is Pitch stealing everything Jack fought for." Whirling one last time, she gestured with a sharp wave of one hand towards their captive friend. "This is us _letting _him."

The other three Guardians had no response to that, and Tooth did not seem to require one.

"Nightlight wasn't trapped forever," she pointed out firmly. "There's no reason to believe Jack will be any different."

"Maybe…" Bunny began, trailed off, then picked up his line of thought a second time. "Maybe not forever, but how long is forever anyway? Tooth, it could easily be _centuries_ before Pitch musters up enough power to break free from something like that. By that time, anyone who ever believed in Jack will be dead, including Jamie. Doesn't Jamie deserve some token of their friendship if that does happen?"

"_If _it happens, Bunny." Tooth picked up on that one word and held onto it for all she was worth. "If. There is still a chance we can save him. We haven't tried everything. Manny…"

"Can't or won't help," the Guardian of Hope said, his tone unmoving. "Not since we lost Katherine and Nightlight. You _know_ that. You're just grasping at straws."

"And you're giving up!" Tooth cried in response. "On Jack, Bunny! _You_ were the one who said it was his fight, who believed he could take Pitch on his own, and he _did_. Why won't you believe in him now?"

"Because look where letting him fight on his own got him!" Bunny roared back, and Tooth's expression softened immediately. "He's a bloody _icicle,_ Toothiana!"

"Oh, Bunny," she sighed. "It wasn't your fault."

"Wasn't it?" the Pooka questioned. "Aren't we all to blame in some way? I mean, how the hell did any of this happen anyway? How did we get to be so blind, and arrogant, and _stupid_ to ever relax our guard? If we'd done our jobs right… If we'd kept an eye on Pitch the way we were _meant_ to things never would have got this far. But we didn't. We sat back and did nothing. We ignored our fellow spirits. We pushed away the ones who could have become our most dangerous enemies with sufficient provocation, and we sat on our little pedestals and thought ourselves so important. Now that's all come crashing down around our ears just to prove we were wrong, and Jack's the one whose bloody paying for it."

"We couldn't have known, Bunny," North said, breaking into the two-sided argument.

"We _should_ have," the Pooka countered. "Or what use are we, really? What is a Guardian if they're not actually guarding? Nothing, nothing at all."

"I still think we should wait," Tooth insisted, obviously trying to steer the conversation back to safer ground. Bunny had to admit, in that small part of himself that was still clinging to reason and not anger or grief, that none of them were terribly comfortable with the fact they had let themselves drift so far apart from the children they protected for so long. Bringing it up now, when the indirect consequences of their isolation were so cruelly highlighted, would not serve any purpose besides upsetting them all even more. "Before giving Jamie the staff. We need to give Jack a chance."

"A chance to do what, Tooth?" he asked wearily.

"I don't know," the fairy admitted reluctantly. "But giving up on him feels wrong. No, it _is_ wrong."

"This is not giving up, Toothy," North told her quietly. "This is accepting truth. Pitch is gone, and, as always, price has been paid. You know cycle. Many years will pass, Pitch will return, and a new price will be set for his defeat."

"North, _please_," the Guardian of Memories all but begged. "Just give Jack a little time."

North simply shook his head, however, and Bunny knew he was thinking of the last time they had all clung to hope for years and _years _only to have it turn to bitter disappointment. North had easily been the most wounded of them all on that occasion, and it wasn't really any surprise to see him unwilling to take the same risk now. It was easier, in a way, to accept that Jack was gone and to face the grief of that than it was to live with the uncertain hope that maybe, _maybe_ he might be returned to them. On the other hand, a part of him agreed with Tooth as well. Jack had surprised them before on more than one occasion, was it fair to them to accept this end so easily? Shouldn't they try to fight it?

Bunny turned to Sandy, the eldest among them, and the only one who hadn't made his opinion known. Sandy's expression was hard to read, the Guardian of Dreams seemingly lost in his own pensive thoughts, but, when he sensed Bunny's gaze on him, he offered his fellow Guardian a small nod, and that was enough for Bunny.

"We'll give the staff to Jamie," he said at last, drawing the attention of the other three before emphasizing his point. "For _safekeeping_. That doesn't mean we're giving up on Jack, Tooth." He turned to the female Guardian. "I promise you I'm not going to give up, but there's also nothing we can do right now. So we give the staff to Jamie, and let him take care of it, so that when Jack comes back we'll know exactly where to go to get it."

Tooth offered him a watery smile in return for that concession, mouthing a silent 'thank you', even as North's expression grew ever so slightly rigid. Bunny understood his reservations, knowing full well how dangerous an unfulfilled hope could be, but having no hope at all was a poor alternative. Tooth was right, he was the Guardian of Hope, and abandoning that now would not only be a betrayal to Jack, but also a betrayal of his self. It might end in disaster. It may very well end in tears. But, when all was said and done, that did not matter. All that mattered was that there was a chance, no matter how slim, that Jack might yet escape this fate, and that was for enough for Bunny.

"Which one of us should take it?" Tooth asked, breaking the silence that had fallen, and, despite what they had just discussed, Bunny had a feeling it took everything she had to tear herself away from the ice and the boy contained within it. She was purposefully not looking back, but the lines of tension in her body as she faced North belied the forced steadiness in her voice.

Sandy answered her question by quickly forming four figures over his head, and then two more, clearly meant to represent children.

"Sandy's right." Bunny nodded, though somewhat reluctantly. "We should do this together."

It wouldn't make it any easier, telling Jamie together, but it was the least they could do, for both Jack _and_ his favorite believer.

Right now, it was the _only_ thing they could do, and Bunny tried not to think of the way that thought was like a thousand stinging needles plunging into his chest all at once. This wasn't the way this fight should have ended. This wasn't the way any of them would have chosen to see Pitch locked away again. This wasn't… this wasn't _fair_, and a tiny voice that would not be silenced whispered in the back of his mind that the Guardians had failed again. They had lost another child, and, hope or not, that child may never be returned to them.

Bunny wasn't sure if he would ever be able to forgive himself for that.

* * *

The Wind whistled forlornly across the surface of the frozen pool, bewildered by this sudden turn of events, and saddened by its sudden inability to touch its youngest child. Something was wrong, terribly, terribly wrong, but it had not perceived enough of what occurred to be able to discern what. It darted about the edge of the lake, then swept across the ice once more, lingering briefly at the spot the frost child's companions had departed from. They had been so terribly sad as they left, shoulders and heads bowed, eyes damp and faces pale, but it had not understood until it tried to reach through the clear, crystal window and found its cold touch barred. Its youngest child lay right before it, but it was denied the privilege of drawing him near and wrapping him in its chilled embrace.

Agitated, it soared back and forth across the lake's icy veneer, trying to grind away at a surface that was harder than it had any right to be. Its efforts proved fruitless, however, and eventually it stilled, forming a small, spiraling column of air above the frozen prison of its favored ward, its whistle reduced to a soft wail of mourning. A soft rustle of warmer air fluttered along its flank, and its attention drifted to the sylphs that had joined in its circling pattern in slight precedence to their mistress. The eldest of its offspring settled on the ice with obvious unease, no more comfortable with these chill surroundings than her counterpart was with her own favored climate. The ice did not melt at her touch, however, not even in the slightest measure, and she frowned as she knelt, heat waves rippling about her as her sylphs darted to her side.

Two others joined the Wind in watching. The kindest of its children, whose mismatched eyes watched her sister in mingled hope and the bracing readiness of one who expected to be soon disappointed. The archer stood alongside her, his dark eyes darkened further by the bitterness of harsh remembrance, the bright twinkle that usually lingered in their depths utterly extinguished.

"Mara?" the younger sister's quiet whisper was barely audible, but it did not go unheard.

"Give me a moment, Aur," the Spirit of Summer commanded, though her voice was thick with the strain of the amount of power she was bringing forth.

The Wind circled anxiously, as eager to see the result of its child's efforts as either of the others, and as equally disappointed when Mara rose suddenly, taking a step back, and a long moment to catch her breath.

"I am sorry," she said at last, turning to meet her sister's saddened gaze. "This is a seal that I cannot break. It was meant to contain, and it has served its purpose, perhaps a little too well."

"Then we have lost another," Aur murmured sorrowfully.

"He was never ours to lose," Mara contradicted

"Perhaps he should have been," was Aur's calm response. "If we had bothered to care a little more, things would never have gotten this far."

"It is a little late for such thoughts now," Mara said pragmatically. "I have done what I can, and it is not enough. It is time to go home, Aur."

Its eldest did not wait for an answer before summoning her sylphs to her side, using them to boost her onto the Wind's back, and from there sailing onwards to a destination known only to her self. Its other child hesitated a moment, kneeling to touch the ice in deference to the sacrifice made, before rising and turning to her silent companion.

"Eros?"

"I am going to stay a while," the archer replied, his eyes trained downwards, on the figure held captive within the lake's frozen depths. Aur's eyes softened, and she reached to touch his arm.

"This was not your fault."

Black eyes met bronze and green.

"I know," he answered softly. "I am going to stay anyway."

Aur nodded, before reaching out with a call that was still weaker than it should have been, but strong enough to touch the one at whom it was directed.

"Mother," she uttered heavily. "Take me home."

* * *

The quill's nib drifted back and forth across the paper, fine lines circling and twining and twisting as they slowly came together to create the masterpiece they were meant to be. The pen stilled, and gray eyes studied the features recreated on the parchment with a slight frown. The likeness was not as perfect as the other drawings that littered the walls of the small room, but the face was recognizable, and after a moment's hesitation the artist laid her pen aside and closed the leather bound journal. Rising from the seat she had occupied for the past few hours she strode past the shelves lined with many similar tomes, stepping through the doorway and out onto the balcony beyond.

The thick cover of the forest canopy overhead prevented the light from above from piercing the gloom beneath, although a sort of soft, green glow permeated the darkness, and nearby a silver light, seemingly emanating from nothing at all, provided a break in the monotony. She walked towards the light, folding her skirt about her as she took a seat at its side, and gazed up into troubled, pale eyes.

"What is it?" she asked softly, though in her heart she already knew.

Her spectral companion, the source of the glow that now shed its light upon her, simply shook his head sadly, and she knew, without needing to be told, what that meant. Words had never been needed between them, not even in the darkest of times.

"I thought this time would be different," she whispered regretfully, almost to herself, one hand straying unwittingly to the heavy, oval gemstone that hung about her neck. Pale eyes traced her movements, and she glanced up, catching his gaze and quickly shaking her head. "I promised not to misuse it," she said uncertainly. "But how am I supposed to know when it is right to do so and when it is wrong?"

Her old friend rose from his seated position, and leapt down lightly off the balcony rail upon which he had been perched, taking a seat beside her as he gently bumped her shoulder. That touch no longer hurt as it once had, and she smiled slightly, taking comfort from the gesture itself and the knowledge her own healing had come so far. But was it far enough? Dare she use this priceless gift the once owner did not even know he had given? Her hands touched the delicate chain about her neck, and she lifted the stone hanging off it out from beneath her shirt, cradling the egg-shaped pendant in her hands as she stared at its flickering colors.

"Is it worth the risk?" she wondered aloud, and her companion nodded vigorously. She glanced at him, still hesitant, but unable to deny him this if it was something he truly wanted. She could not rightly deny him anything, after what he had given up for her. "Is _he_ worth the risk?"

_Family_, he reminded her, his mouth not moving, but the words sounding clearly inside her head nonetheless. _Is always worth it_.

"Alright, then." She nodded, her mind decided. "We'll try."


	27. Chapter 26-Where the Beginning is the En

**A/N: Hello all, and welcome to the last chapter of Blizzard. There is an epilogue to come after this one to tie up all the loose ends, but I've put what was originally going to be in two chapters into one, and hopefully the quality doesn't falter because of that. I have also edited the last chapter, so the first section is different. You may want to go back and reread that piece before this one, but it's not necessary to understand what's going on in this one.  
**

**Also, wow! 53 reviews on the last chapter? That's a record! I am again overwhelmed by the sheer awesomeness of you lot.**

**You guys should also check out the pictures Narwe drew for me for this story. I tried to include the links below, but Fanfiction net is as iffy as always about these things, so you can either find them on Narwe's tumblr (twilightsaphir dot tumblr dot com) or mine. (thetimelesscycle dot tumblr dot com) where I've reblogged and liked them both.  
**

**Endings are always very hard to write, especially when a story that was supposed to have only a single storyline splits down so many divergent paths. I have been both daunted and inspired by the number of people who have complimented me on my writing style, my ability to weave a story, and my characterization. So, here's to hoping I don't let you guys down on the final leg of the amazing journey this fanfic has been.  
**

**Read, review, and enjoy, and I'll see you all in the epilogue.**

**Cheerio,**

**Cheekyrox**

**CHAPTER 26**

**-Where the Beginning is the End-**

Willow did not have any rational explanation for why she had returned to the frozen lake. There was no justifiable reason for the fact she had not simply fled as soon as she had lost the battle with Pitch. She should have gone straight back to the Grove, to the safety it offered, and to the punishment that was doubtlessly awaiting her. Yet, instead she had lingered, her emotions a confused and tangled mess, and she had watched Pitch's plan through to its ill-fated conclusion. She had thought seeing the Guardians brought to their knees might offer her some sort of solace for the losses they had carved into her own life, but witnessing their defeat had brought no such comfort, and, strangely enough, neither did seeing their newest addition make a sacrifice the outcome of which she should have been revelling in. But she _wasn't_ revelling in it, and the cold, hollow void left in the wake of the exacting of her revenge would not be filled by satisfaction. She was beginning to doubt it would be filled by anything at all.

So, maybe that was the explanation for why she had returned. The hope of finally discovering a way to plug that void. To find the peace that had eluded her for so long. Whatever the reason behind the unfading urge it had driven her back out onto the frozen lake, her footsteps light and soundless as she approached the place where her rival had fallen, and where a solitary figure remained kneeling in a silent vigil.

"Willow."

Eros acknowledged her when she was three paces out, but he did not turn, remaining seated with his legs folded beneath him and his hands resting in his lap. His bow and quiver lay beside him, both ends of the latter covered, and she wondered, briefly, if he had been waiting for her arrival. If it was her presence he was here to guard against. She closed the space between them with hesitant strides, taking a seat beside him and staring through the clear ice at the still figure of one she had named her enemy before she even knew his name.

"Does it help?" Eros asked, and she turned to meet his dark gaze in confusion, not understanding the question. "Seeing him like this," the Valentine spirit clarified, tilting his head to the side. "Does it make you feel better at all?"

"No." The word had escaped her before she even had time to consider her feelings on the matter, but she knew it to be true regardless. Seeing Jack Frost locked away and contained as she had long advocated he should be, if not destroyed outright, had done nothing to ease the ache she had long been trying to rid herself of.

"Revenge seldom does," Eros observed neutrally, plucking something off the ground beside him. It took Willow a moment to realize it was an arrowhead, though nothing like the ones attached to either of his distinctive sets of shafts.

"Then what _does_ help?" she asked plaintively, her pride having forsaken her, so that she was ready to _beg_ for a solution if it would ease the terrible ache inside her chest. Anger and the desire for vengeance had filled it for a time, but now that both were gone the emptiness was back, and she dreaded its return with every fibre of her being.

"I can't tell you that," he answered her softly. "It is something you must discover for yourself, but, if I were you, I would start with forgiving your sister for her mistakes and what they inevitably cost her. And perhaps forgiving yourself as well."

"For what?" she demanded stiffly. "I did nothing wrong!"

"But you didn't see it coming, did you?" he pointed out, watching her with a look that was all too knowing. "Skadi turned on you and you _never_ saw it coming, because she was your sister and the very idea she would do such a thing was inconceivable. You were too naïve, too trusting, and she used that against all three of you and then laughed in your faces as she did her utmost to destroy you. You loved her and she betrayed you, and you can't forgive yourself for making that mistake, or the fact your wilful blindness to her true nature cost every last one of your nymphs their very existence."

"That wasn't my fault!" Willow protested, so furious she was close to bursting into tears. "She was my _sister_, how was I supposed to know she would do such a thing?"

"You could not have known." Eros simply shrugged. "And that's what you can't forgive yourself for, and why you weren't willing to give anyone else a single chance, let alone a second. Love has its risks just as surely as it has its benefits, and you were not willing to gamble the one for the other."

"Spoken like a true romantic." Willow tried for scornful, for the aloofness she had hidden behind for so many years, but she feared she came out sounding more bitter and envious than anything else. "What are you even doing here? You didn't even _know_ him."

"We had never met," Eros corrected her with a fleeting smile. "That does not mean I did not know him. I know that he once had a family. That he loved his little sister more than anything else in the world. That the only reason he is a part of _our_ world is because that love drove him to make the ultimate sacrifice. To do what I once failed to do. Jack Frost _died_ to save his sister, and what gift did he receive in return for that single act of selfless bravery? He received you, Willow, someone who hated him without provocation, and an entire world that abandoned and ignored him because of the legacy of one who was, at heart, nothing like he. Even without your personal vendetta, he would have lived beneath the shadow of the odium Skadi's actions had awoken. And for what? The fact they share a similar power? A gift he never asked for and likely never wanted? We had never met, Willow, and that was my mistake. I should have laid aside the ghosts of the past and let myself act freely in the present, but just because we never exchanged a single word does not mean I can't admire the person he _chose_ to become despite every adversity placed before him."

It was a two-pronged accusation, and one that momentarily silenced Willow, because she could not deny the truth of it. Jack could have become another Skadi, but not for the reasons Willow had always maintained. Rather, she could have been the _cause_ of that repetition of history. She, and every other who had allowed the events of the past to colour the future. But Jack had not, he had stood apart from the role his life tried to shape for him, and had not fallen into the same trap of bitterness and hatred that she herself had stumbled headlong into. She did not admire the winter spirit, or even rescind her dislike for him, but she was forced to admit, with the reluctance of one who has been blinded for so long they do not _want_ to see the light, that he had made the better choice.

"Here." Eros rose before she had a chance to gather her thoughts, taking one of her hands and pressing something into it, before closing her fingers around the object and stepping back. "I want you to have this."

Frowning, Willow gazed down at the cold metal that now rested in her palm, recognizing the arrowhead Eros himself had been grasping moments before, though not its meaning.

"What is this?" she asked blankly.

"That," Eros told her. "Is the arrow my brother used to kill me." Shocked, she turned to stare at him. "You are not the only person in the world who has watched their family turn into something they could not recognise, and who has suffered the pain of being betrayed by someone so close to you they take a piece of your heart with you when they go. We don't all choose to let it consume us, Willow, and I like to think we are better off for it."

"I don't…" She hesitated, but the burden was too great, and she had shouldered it for too long to leave the words unsaid now. "I don't know how _not_ to be like this, Eros."

"I know." He smiled gently, closing her fingers about the arrowhead a second time. "But hold onto that, and maybe one day you'll learn."

His gaze went past her then, and his dark eyes widened in unconcealed surprise.

"What?" she demanded, instantly alert. "What is it?"

"Correct me if I am wrong," Eros began, his voice strained. "But wasn't there a winter spirit in that lake a few moments ago?"

Willow whirled, staring into the clear, icy depths in search of the small frame that had once lain trapped there. There was nothing to see, however, but the ice itself, and the few, dark tendrils of Pitch's shadow that reached near enough the surface to be visible.

Jack Frost was gone.

* * *

"Shall I tell you a story?"

The voice was full of warmth and laughter, of the touch of the sun on a warm summer's day and the joy that only a child can possess, but Jack did not recognize it. He tried to open his eyes, but the lids felt weighted down and heavy, and he was far too comfortable, stretched out upon the soft grass with his hands beneath his head, to bother fighting against his body's inclinations. It was peaceful here, with the soft rustle of the wind in the trees above his head, and the dappled sunlight breaking through the leaves that he could feel dancing across his face. He remembered taking his sister out into the woods on countless occasions, and he wondered where she was today.

He had not seen her all morning, he was certain.

"Shall I tell you a story?" the voice asked again, and he wondered whom it was that sat so close beside him, and yet was not the presence that usually filled that spot. "I'm good at telling stories."

"I bet you are," he caught himself answering, and heard soft, bubbling laughter in response.

"Well?" It was a girl's voice. Or perhaps a young woman's. It was difficult to tell. "Shall I?"

"Sure." He could feel a grin playing around the edges of his lips. "Tell away. What's it about?"

There was a rustle of fabric as she moved, and he could picture her spreading her skirts out around her, the creaking of a leather spine preceding the moment when she began reading the words from the book he now knew rested in her hands.

"This is a story about family," she said quietly. "About belief, and about true courage. You'll like it."

"I'm sure I will," he replied. "If you ever get around to telling it."

"Patience," she chided, with the air of one deliberately adopting overly adult airs. "One does not rush story telling."

She waited a moment, giving him another opportunity to interrupt, but Jack wisely held his peace, and after a minute or too she shifted her position again slightly and began.

"Once upon a time there was a small band of unlikely heroes. An odd assortment of people no one would have thought could work so well together. But they did. They were brilliant, courageous, kind, and everything that heroes are supposed to be. They were as much family as they were friends, and there wasn't a single thing in the world that could stop them when they had their minds set on a goal. But for every hero there must be a villain, and the one our band of merry misfits faced was a devious and dark soul. He was a shadow, a nightmare, a fear, and no matter how many times our heroes thought they had sent him scuttling back into the shadows he always re-emerged at a later time, ready to sow havoc again."

"Sounds like someone I know," Jack murmured, then wondered why he had said it. He didn't know anyone like that… did he?

"I'm not surprised," the storyteller answered lightly. "Our heroes knew him very well, and as time wore on and they continued to face him every time they turned a corner they began to weary of their ongoing struggle. I am sorry to say that they argued, divided over how best to deal with the shadow, and eventually they went their separate ways. Two of their number, those they thought of as the youngest, the children in their family, went to speak with the villain, to try and make him see reason." She paused a moment dramatically, then uttered sadly, "They failed, and when they fell they hurt more than just themselves. Their family was broken, and, even though the villain was beaten again, it did not take away the pain of what the heroes had lost. Their hurt made them lose faith, it made them lose their belief, and they each retreated into their own worlds. No longer a family, barely even friends, they continued to each do their own duty, and they forgot the blessing they had once had."

"That's a sad story." He opened his eyes, surprised to find them a great deal more cooperative than they had been during his last attempt, and stared up into the warm, grey eyes of the storyteller. She smiled at him, shaking her head slightly, so that her loose auburn tresses spilled over her shoulders, and he was struck with a sudden sense of familiarity, though he was certain he had never met her before.

"It is not done yet," she scolded lightly. "Stop interrupting."

He grinned, but obediently fell silent.

"The heroes carried on in this way for many years," she said, and, though a book rested open on her lap, he could now tell that she was not reading from it, or even glancing at it as she spoke. "And might have done so indefinitely, had the villain not returned and forced them to awake from their self-imposed isolation. They came together, one by one, and it was then that their leader spoke to them for the first time since their family had been broken. He gave them a name. Something that would change the heroes' fates forever. Two simple words that shifted the balance of power so far it could not be shifted back."

"And what were they?" he asked, suddenly breathless as he pushed himself to his elbows, staring expectantly at the young woman seated beside him.

"You know already," she informed him gently. "Just as you know what change they wrought. How the one to which they belonged walked into the heroes' lives and turned them into a family once more. How he became the heart of unity they had lost. How he risked everything to prove himself to them, and won his place as a Guardian of Childhood a hundred times over when he showed them the power of belief they had forgotten."

Jack stared at her, both words lingering on the tip of his tongue, but a different question leaving his lips. "Who are you?"

"I am the chronicler of the past," was her reply. "I am the storyteller of the present, and I am the one who will write the future. A future you shall be a part of, for I will not write the sad story it will be should you not."

Jack stared at her, shock washing over him as the answer to the riddles plaguing his mind finally came to him. Her face was familiar to him because he had _seen_ it before, on a tapestry in the North Pole, and on the painting that sat, half hidden, on the mantelpiece in North's study.

"Katherine?" he whispered in honest disbelief.

The auburn haired woman smiled, the gesture open and filled with genuine pleasure. "It is good to meet you at last, Jack Frost," she said kindly. "I've been wanting to thank you for what you did for North and the others for such a long time."

"B—but," he stammered falteringly. "You're here? You're alive? You _remember_? Then why haven't you…"

"Look around you, Jack," she replied softly. "We are not where you think we are."

Jack obeyed her request, his frown deepening as he realized he was indeed lying in a small wooded copse, but it was most certainly not the place he had seen in his memories. The trees around him were truly ancient and overgrown, with only a small clearing breaking through the thick, wild undergrowth, and the glow he had mistake for sunlight was in fact emanating from a spectral boy perched a few branches above the forest floor, watching both him and Katherine with open curiosity. Utterly bewildered by this point, Jack pushed himself into a sitting position, turning to Katherine for answers.

"Where am I?"

"This is Big Root," Katherine told him solemnly, gesturing towards the enormous tree trunk that sat behind him, and thus had been missed in his first scrutiny of his location. Even amongst the gloom of the clearly ancient forest the titanic tree stood out, and Jack could sense the barely tangible hint of magic in the air. "The once home of the wizard Ombric, and all that remains of the village of Santoff Claussen. We now stand in what was once the home of the Guardians."

"But I thought Santoff Claussen was destroyed!" Jack blurted, before realizing how insensitive that might seem, and wincing as he bit his lip.

"The village was." Katherine nodded sadly. "And we lost Ombric trying to defend it. But, by some miracle, Big Root survived, as did the enchanted forest."

Jack frowned. "Does North know?"

"I am not sure," Katherine responded. "He may, or he may not. Even if he knows a small part of Santoff Claussen survived I doubt he would wish to come here. The place holds too many memories."

"It also holds you," Jack pointed out, well aware Katherine had not yet answered his prior question in full.

"I am not an altogether happy memory for North," Katherine reminded him.

Jack knew that was true. He had seen it in the big man's eyes as he told the tale of the Guardians' past, but he still did not understand why Katherine and Nightlight were here to begin with, and not with the others of their kind. Seeing as how the direct question had received no response, however, he tried a more roundabout route.

"How did I get here? Last I remember…" Actually, he preferred not to think of the last thing he remembered. Of that vicious tug on his ankle and his horrified realization of what Pitch had done as the ice closed above his head and he drowned all over again.

"Do you know what this is?" Katherine asked, disturbing his dark ponderings as she lifted a chain hanging about her neck to show him the large pendant hanging from its delicate links.

He blinked a moment, even more bewildered, before venturing a response. "An egg?"

She smiled, clearly amused. "It is," she said in all seriousness. "But this is a very important egg, that once belonged to a good friend of mine. You've met him."

"You mean Bunny," Jack guessed, not at all surprised when she nodded, for how many other friends did he have that were so obsessed with eggs? "What makes it so special?"

"It used to sit on a staff," she explained. "Bunny's staff. He used it to travel through space and time."

"He… Wait, what?"

Katherine laughed, the sound as clear and bright as the tinkling of running water. "He was quite different when I knew him," she admitted. "I imagine he is glad he no longer appears as he once did. I can only imagine what inventive titles you would have dreamed up for him had you seen what he looked like when I met him."

Jack was almost distracted enough by that statement to ask, but in the end decided the time traveling egg device was more important. "So you can travel through time?"

"I can." She nodded.

"And space?"

That earned him another gesture of acknowledgement.

Jack scowled. "But you couldn't be bothered visiting the Guardians to let them know you were alright?"

Katherine's expression faltered slightly.

"It is not so simple as that," she uttered softly, and Jack almost voiced an apology, for he felt certain he had hurt her, but was not given a chance to. "When Nightlight and I went to confront Pitch he did more to us than simply trying to destroy us. North didn't tell you everything about what happened back then, Jack. He didn't tell you how much Pitch wanted me to become like one of his Fearlings. How close he came to succeeding. Not even North knows what truly happened that day, and he is probably better off for it."

"Why?" Jack's mouth was dry. "What _did _happen?"

"Pitch changed me," Katherine uttered in little more than whisper. "He turned me into something I don't care to remember. Something that my friends could not recognize, nor did I want them to see me as such. When the Guardians fell… When the Man in the Moon changed them, they had fallen as heroes, I… I was not so fortunate."

Raising her hand, Katherine removed one of the gloves Jack had not even realized she was wearing, revealing the skin beneath. To Jack's surprise and alarm, that skin was not wholly natural, but imbued with a darkness that lent it a grey, shadowed hue.

"Manny couldn't help me," Katherine continued to explain. "Because his very touch burned, and even being near Nightlight was painful enough. I was forced to come here, where the trees protected me from the light, and here I have stayed. I am better now, than I was, but I do not know for certain how much of what Pitch did to me still remains a part of who I am. I don't truly know whose side I would have been fighting on should I have chosen to join the fray, and for that reason I chose to stay here, away from my friends, to keep them safe."

"I'm sorry." And he was, because he _knew_ full well how painful solitude was, and he had experienced, with equal clarity, the desire to hold oneself apart in order to keep the ones you cared about safe. Had he not, after all, done the very same thing?

"It's okay," she assured him with a gentle smile. "I have Nightlight to keep me company, and Kailash. I am not entirely on my own."

"But if you've been trapped here all this time, how did you know I was in trouble?"

"_I_ am trapped here," Katherine elaborated. "Nightlight is not, and the moonbeams are his friends. He can converse with them whenever he has need of knowledge, and, even if Manny no longer speaks with his chosen few, that does not mean he no longer keeps watch."

"So the Man in the Moon knew you were here, then?" Jack surmised. "And he never thought to tell the others?"

"I asked him not to," Katherine admitted with the slightest hint of shame. "I didn't want any of them to see me like that."

"But you're better now, right?" Jack's excitement grew as he realized what that could mean. "So you can come with me. We can go and tell the others you're alive!"

"I can't, Jack." Katherine stilled him with those three simple words. "I'm not ready. What I can do, however, is send you back to them. Back where you are _meant_ to be."

Jack stared at her a moment, not quite comprehending her refusal. "You're not coming."

"Maybe," she began softly. "Maybe one day I'll be brave enough to try. Until then I need you to look after them for me, Jack. They need you. They need you so they don't forget what you've taught them. They need to remember to believe."

There was a seriousness behind that request that he could not ignore, and Jack took the time to let the words sink in, to let their meaning resonate within him, before making his response.

"Okay," he said simply. "Okay, I can do that. But you have to promise me something in return."

Nightlight dropped down to the forest floor, and the pair shared a silent glance Jack had a feeling exchanged a thousand words, before Katherine turned back to him.

"Very well, then," she agreed. "What is it you want?"

"I want you to _promise_ me you will come back one day. That North and the others won't always have to believe that they failed you. That Pitch won't win, even in the simplicity of keeping the Guardians apart."

"That is a promise I will gladly keep." Katherine smiled, and Jack wondered if he imagined the way Nightlight's glow brightened when she did so. "We will meet again soon, Jack Frost, you have my word."

It was all the reassurance Jack needed, and so he did not protest when Katherine grasped the egg-pendant in one hand and reached out to touch him with the other. Her fingers brushed against his shoulder, and Santoff Claussen vanished in a single, bright flash.

* * *

Jamie took the staff with quivering hands, staring at it with such a lost expression Sandy could barely stand to watch. The same look was reflected on the faces of each of the Guardians, and tears were streaming down young Sophie's face. She did not fully understand what had happened, but the words 'Jack is gone' had been enough, and Bunny was now doing his best to soothe her. Baby Tooth had been devastated by the news, and had disappeared into Jamie's pocket, refusing to come out no matter how much Tooth tried to cajole her. They were all a sorry sight, a broken wreck of shock and sorrow when this should have been a time for celebration, and Sandy found it an image all the more grievous for knowing what _should_ have been.

"He can't be…" Jamie protested at last, finding his voice. "He said… he said he was going to stay."

"He stopped Pitch," North said heavily. "But he couldn't…"

"We thought, uh, we thought you should have that," Bunny picked up where the Christmas Guardian had left off. "You're the one who fixed it, so… it's yours now. To keep safe."

"Actually, I think that's mine."

That voice.. that _voice_.

"A good friend made it for me."

Sandy whirled, his eyes alighting upon the most welcome sight he had ever seen.

"And I'd kind of like it back."

"Jack!" Jamie was across the room faster than the Sandman could blink, though Jack somehow managed to drop into a crouch in time to intercept the tight embrace his young believer thrust upon him. Sophie was only a few seconds behind her brother, her tears turned to laughter, and Sandy was not at all surprised when the rest of the Guardians exchanged a glance, then moved as one to form a circle around their youngest.

In that single moment, the world set itself to rights. The shadow of the past few weeks was washed away with the dawning light of the rising sun, and Sandy did not miss the last, solitary moonbeam that darted once around the room before its pale, silver light was supplanted by the red glow of the dawn. Floating to the window, he formed a hat with dreamsand and offered a cheerful salute to the fading silhouette of the silver moon, before turning back to watch with a fond smile as the Guardians all but crushed Jack beneath the weight of their joyous relief. Their youngest was barely visible beneath them all, but his laughter rang out as clearly as any others.

Pitch was defeated, his Fearling army gone, and they were all still alive.

Still together.

It was over.

At long, _long _last, it was finally over.

**As a final note, I know the power I have given to Bunny's egg thing is not strictly canon compatable, but Jack is also a SPIRIT, not the living being that Ombric and Bunny were, which is what I've used to explain the difference. That and I just do what I want, but you guys know that by now. XD**


	28. Epilogue-The Promises We Make

**A/N: Aw, man, this chapter was a monster to write! I'm sorry it's taken so long, guys, I really am, but it turns out that going from working 17.5 hours a week to almost 40 is a bit of a shock to the system. Add on top of that travel time to and from work, and the need for sleep, and I honestly only get about three hours of life to myself each day. Writing has not, needless to say, been a priority.**

**Nevertheless, this mega sized chapter is now finished, though its a little bit of a bitzer chapter, and I'm not really sure how it flows in regards to the rest of the story. I'll let you guys decide whether it meets the standard. You normally do anyway! XD Also, for those of you who haven't done so already, don't forget to include your story requests with your reviews. I may be a little bit slow churning them out, but I promise to write all requests that fall within the parameters.**

**I normally post my finished stories on my freewebs site as a PDF so people can download and keep them to read at their own leisure, and will be doing the same with Blizzard once I've had time to proofread and edit things as I see necessary. I've had some pretty cool fanart drawn for me for this story, and will be including those (with full credit to their creators, naturally) in the PDF. If anybody would like to add to that by illustrating a chapter or something, feel free to do so so. I would love you forever. ;-)**

**As a final note, I would like to thank Emememe, Nada1224, feathered moon wings, 1valleygirl4, Achlys, Agent Era, Aimmy14, Alaia Skyhawk, Alice Nightray, AlyKat16, Alyss-8D, angelfabeth, anime-dark-fairy, Animebookfreaker, April-san, Autumn Daughter, AutumnFirstLight, Autumnights, Az The Dragon, beadwork, Beccy-chan, Ben Tennyson Lover, Black Wilted Lotus. Bloodorange172, Breezyfeather, bukalay, Burnished Angel, ButterCat, CalamityJim, camitake, Catflower Queen, Cayran, CherryBerryB, CHiKa-RoXy, chocolateCake27, Ciel Farron, CJaMes12, Claudiaaa8D, Cocoaflower, Crescent Zenith, Crystal di Angelo, CrystalxRose, DaisukethePenguin, Dancing on Clouds of Sorrow, , demonsLOver, Double-Gemini, DragonflyonBreak, Dragowolf, dreams-that-pour-onto-da-earth, EJR HorseLady, , elfpricess, EliteKessu, em (Guest), emerypony, EmperialGem21, Endless Labyrinth, EpicDetour9, Eternal She-Wolf, Exxal, Filigree09, foxare, fractalsFrost, Frost and Winter Chills, Fumus000, Gage39, gameloverx, Gillianafs, godsdaughter77, Golden-Flute, Guardian of Winter, guardian-of-fun, Hana-Liatris  
Hartanna, headlong-for-freedom, Heart'sRose, history101, HubridBunny, hypercell, Ihni, ihonestlydontknow, Iikhitata, InsaneKuroNeko, isthisparidise, IWillNeverStopFangirling, JayaEmera, jessiebubble10, juniperlei, Katherine Apollo Karma, Kay Hau, KellieAM, keske, KetchupApple, Keyanna, Kick-Aft, Kirara-Elfkin, KoiKyuuiKitai, kyuubecky, LadyPsycho16, Lasae abyss, Lazy Gaga, lilalove88, Lindyn Guards, Llatias, Lovepuppy316, Magiccatprincess, maltese, Marceline Avril, marinoa, , MartialArtsDancer, melancholyblood, melaniecullen96, Messier42, Minako Mikoto, mint ink, miraeyeteeth, MisteryMaiden, MoonlitMelody, Moonumb, , mythamagica, Nada1224, Narwe, Nathalaia, Neellok, nickyx3, nigishikoi, nimbi-piru, NoNameTheJellyfish, NothingIWontGive, oceanlover4evr, OctoberThirtyFirst, OtakuAme, outlandish mind, peppymint, Polish, ProwlHawthorne, pucflek, Queen of the Red Skittle, Quillink14, Radar1388, RadicalCat, Rahar Moonfire, Rand0mSmil3z, RandomKrazyPerson, Rani-Girl, RedKetchup, Reflective Reviewer 7, Reidluver, River Wren, romirola, sbcarri, Scotty1609, scrubslova, Seefs, Shadow The Assassin, SheDevil333, Sheeijan, Sheeptopus, singing in the jukebox, SlaughterOtter, snowflake1814, sohrem666, SongOfTheBirds, Sora Tayuya, Souffles in Space, Squeakin, starskulls, StellaBound, sweettea1, Syrra-chan, TDBrigit, The Nova Dragon, the-ice-cold-alchemist, thecoldforest, Tixiona-redmoonXIII, TSRowenwood, Turkeyhead987, tynder20, UnicornsPoopingRainbows, VideoGamingFreak1213, WRATH77, WriteousXanthera, XCountrySkiier03, Xeylah, xheartskreuzx, xMidnightAurorax, xXOnceUponADreamXx, XxPurpleStarGazerxX, Yellow-Spider, Zaabeth, zephyr hb, and PippaFrost, along with all Guest reviewers, silent readers, and PMers. Your guys continued support is what kept me inspired even through the low points in the writing of this story, so a huge, huge thank you to all of you.**

**This story is dedicated to my mother, without whose support and instruction I would never have been able to craft this tale.**

**Epilogue**

**-The Promises We Make-**

Christmas that year was destined to be an occasion of great magnificence from the very beginning. Not only was North determined to ensure that every shred of belief that might have escaped them during Pitch's initial attack on the children of the world was restored tenfold, there was also the celebration on the spirits' line of the divide to consider, a celebration the Guardian of Wonder had long ago resolved was going to outshine every last one of its predecessors. The Guardians as a whole had decided, long before the actual date arrived, that all those who had aided them against Pitch were friends worth keeping, and so North had gone out of his way to invite every last one of them to his traditional post Christmas Eve celebration. How the big man managed to stay on top of the preparations for both separate events was a mystery to his fellow Guardians, but none of them hesitated to pitch in as needed, and Jack had even volunteered to go along with North to deliver presents. It was an offer the Christmas Guardian had eagerly accepted, and none of the others had made any attempt to intercede.

It had been six months since they nearly lost their youngest, but none of them had forgotten the feeling invoked by the mere possibility.

It was a wonder to Bunny that they had not yet managed to scare Jack off with their well intentioned, but doubtlessly overwhelming, attentiveness. He did not even know if the winter spirit had had a moment alone since his miraculous escape from the prison forged by his own powers. He had been staying at the North Pole ever since, and when he wasn't spending his days there helping North with this and that he was in Bunny's warren, asking a dozen questions a minute and generally making a nuisance of himself. Bunny had come to realize that such visits normally meant that Jack wanted to travel to Burgess, and for entirely understandable reasons did not wish to travel alone. Sometimes he sought out Sandy or Tooth for such excursions, but the Easter Guardian had not failed to notice he was by the far the most popular choice, and tried not to feel smug over that fact. Jack himself claimed he only dragged Bunny along because Sophie adored his visits, and, whilst there was truth in that, Bunny knew there were others reasons, even if he had no inclination to dig and find out exactly what.

For now Jack seemed happy, and, after everything that had happened with Pitch, that was all any of the Guardians could wish for. And if they were overly vigilant, if they sought to guard Jack from the shadows that might still linger inside of him as much as outside, then who could blame them? What Pitch had done had been a wake-up call like no other, and Bunny still had a lot of questions about what had happened between Pitch and the winter spirit. There were things the Nightmare King had said that had yet to be explained, but he didn't want to push Jack either, and risk sending their youngest scurrying back into the shell none of them had even realized he was hiding inside to begin with. Jack was oddly guarded about some things, no matter how irresponsibly he painted himself, and Bunny was slowly learning when to push and when to let things simmer awhile before he tried removing the lid. There was time to find the answers yet, and he could be patient when he needed to be.

"You know your nose twitches when you think too hard." He startled at the familiar address, setting down the laden tray he had been hauling from the kitchen to the dining room before swinging about to face the intruder. "It's very rabbity."

"Eros." He smiled despite the jab, because this was the one spirit he had been convinced would not turn up despite North's invitation. Eros had an inherent aversion to any sort of large gathering, and generally tended to avoid them and other spirits in general wherever possible. The Valentine spirit preferred interaction with people who could not see him, and, considering what he knew of the archer's history, Bunny couldn't say that he blamed him for that. "I wasn't sure you'd be coming."

"Eh, I've been wanting to see the inside of this place for years." Eros shrugged, his eyes traveling around the room in a way that was far too analytical to be the casual glance it was meant to be. Bunny could almost see him marking the appropriate escape routes, and wondered if he would ever lose that habit. "Besides, it's not often one gets an invitation from the Big Four. From North himself, no less."

"Well, you're certainly not getting an invitation from me," Bunny retorted, trying to set the other more at ease.

"Why?" Eros flashed him a smile. "Afraid I'll turn you even softer than the centre of your caramel eggs?"

"No," Bunny smirked. "I just hate to imagine the sort of damage you and Jack could cause if you teamed up on me."

"Now there's a thought." Eros paused as if truly considering the idea, before abandoning the levity of their conversation to ask a genuine question. "How is the kid, anyway?"

Bunny snorted. "Better than most of us are, I think," he admitted. "Brat bounces back like nobody else."

"That's a good thing, isn't it?" Folding his arms, Eros leaned back against the doorframe, still close enough to the way out to make a quick exit should it prove necessary.

"Depends on whether or not it's genuine." Bunny shrugged, stepping his way carefully through the elves scurrying about the floor until he stood alongside the Valentine spirit.

Eros offered him a faint smile in return. "Oh, ye of little faith."

"Yeah, well, I'm leaning to the more positive side this time around," he admitted grudgingly, before smoothly changing the subject. "Aur tells me you've been busy babysitting Willow. How's that working out for you?"

"I don't choose sides, Bunny, you know that." Eros' expression was instantly guarded, though his words remained light. "Well, unless there are crazed megalomaniacs involved."

"She was my friend too," Bunny reminded him, not without a trace of regret. The souring of that relationship had been painful for both sides, not just the sadly deluded party. "A long time ago. It wasn't exactly pleasant watching that particular downwards spiral."

"Well, in that case, she's doing better," Eros volunteered, though cautiously. "I wouldn't recommend inviting her to any of these little gatherings any time soon, but she seems content to mind her own season and let everyone else worry about theirs now."

Bunny snorted his opinion of that, his verbal reply cut off by the ringing of sleigh bells and North's booming laughter. There was a sudden clash of many different sounds as the sleigh landed and the Yetis and elves bustled forward to tend to the reindeer and the vehicle itself, that preceded by mere seconds the loud boom of the double doors flying open as North paraded his way into the dining room, Jack close on his heels and wearing a grin that normally spelt disaster.

"Bunny!" North admonished, with his usual excessive volume. "Why so slow? Table should be set for feast already! Tooth and Sandy are finished with decorations and presents, but guests will be here any minute, and…Eros, you came!"

"Hey, Big Red," Eros greeted the Christmas Guardian with a sloppy salute. "How goes the good fight?"

"Good, very good!" North clapped his hands together enthusiastically. "Delivered in record time tonight, thanks to Jack. Keep him on, eh?"

He patted the winter spirit on the back as he spoke, and Jack predictably stumbled beneath the weight of the gesture, though he regained his footing swiftly enough and swung about to face Eros with open curiosity. North, his attention distracted by some small detail or another that needed his attention, wandered off without further comment, thus leaving Bunny to watch the two before him interact with interest.

"Hi." Eros' greeting was warm and open. "I don't think we had a chance to be properly introduced before. My name is Lornán, though practically everyone here calls me Eros, unless you're Chucky, of course, and find unreasonable amounts of amusement in the titles Valentine and Cupid. And you, my friend, must be the infamous Jack Frost."

"The one and only." Jack's grin was entirely unrepentant, even as he reached out and shook the hand the Valentine spirit offered him. "You here for the party?"

"Unfortunately, no." Eros pulled a face. "I'm already late for about half a dozen appointments. I just stopped by to torment Bunny and to properly introduce myself. Couldn't have Chucky telling you all sorts of lies without my getting the first word."

"Right." Jack didn't looked convinced, but he hardly missed a beat regardless. "So… Cupid, huh… Do those things work on Pooka's?"

Bunny shot the winter spirit a scandalized glance, whilst Eros simply laughed outright.

"I wish," he chuckled, oblivious to Bunny's fixed glare. "To my disappointment, however, Fearlings and Nightmare Men seem to be the only ones vulnerable to my special concoction. A shame, really. Imagine the things I could make Pitch do if he _wasn't_ immune."

"Never mind that." Jack shook his head. "Imagine what you could make _Bunny_ do."

The Easter Guardian felt nothing but unease upon seeing the conspiring look the pair exchanged, immunity or no immunity, and hurried to interject.

"Alright, that's enough," he said gruffly, stepping between the pair and pointing an accusing digit in Jack's direction. "You save the pranks for later, Frost, when the party's over and your antics aren't likely to cause a war." Turning back to Eros, he added, "As for you, weren't you late for something?"

"I can take a hint, Aster." Eros smiled innocently, a gesture that fooled no one, especially not when paired with an overly elaborate bow. Ignoring the way Bunny rolled his eyes in response, the archer turned to leave, but had only taken one step before he swung back around. "Oh, and I almost forgot. I owe you a thank you, Jack."

"For what?" Jack looked momentarily confused. "Saving you? I was just returning the favour."

"I didn't mean that," Eros corrected him mildly. "I meant for not dying. It makes a nice change."

Before Jack could recover sufficiently from his surprise Eros had turned and departed, leaving Bunny to deal with the bewilderment on the youngest Guardian's face.

"He'll tell you the story behind that one day," he offered. "Maybe. For now, I'd brace yourself. These things normally start off with a bang."

* * *

Bunny had not, Jack reflected ruefully, been joking about the whole bang thing. When North decided to throw a party, he _really_ threw a party, and Jack wasn't really surprised by the fact that involved unhealthily copious amounts of eggnog. He'd bet his staff that both the Christmas Guardian and the Watcher of the Seasons were at least a little drunk by the end of the first hour, and, if the way Aur kept staring with mild disapproval at the Groundhog was any indication, _she_ would not be betting against him should he actually go so far as to initiate the wager. Mara and Bunny, though not quite as lacking in propriety as their peers, were currently engaged in a somewhat fierce argument the cause of which Jack had missed entirely, with Sandy doing his best to play referee, which left Jack lingering on the fringes wondering if now might be a good time to test that cake-launcher he and the elves had constructed whilst North's back was turned.

"Should I be worried?" The soft amusement in Tooth's voice let him know he had been caught out, and he turned to her with an innocent smile.

"Whatever for?"

"I know you too well for that," Tooth scolded, her magenta eyes glittering with humour. Nodding towards the assembled company, she added, "Do you think it's safe to leave them alone for a moment? There's something I'd like to show you."

Jack cast a dubious glance around the table, before pursing his lips in false consideration. "I don't know. I'm not sure they'll be safe without adult supervision."

"You're right." Tooth nodded sagely. "Baby Tooth, front and centre!"

In a whir of tiny wings, the little fairy darted out of Jack's pocket, her all but permanent residence of late, to hover before Toothiana.

"Keep an eye on them," the Guardian of Memories said seriously, holding up a finger to emphasize her point. "We won't be long."

Baby Tooth gave a curt tilt of her head, turning around immediately to fix a narrowed gaze on the assembled party. Jack and Tooth exchanged a grin, before slipping unnoticed from the laden table. They did not go far, just beyond the grand hall into the room on the opposite side where Tooth and Sandy had assembled a Christmas tree and wrapped the various presents North had decreed were to be set beneath it. Tooth closed the door behind them, ensuring they would be alerted if anyone tried to enter, before fluttering across the room to the lit tree and retrieving a small, cylindrical parcel from beneath it. She returned to hover before him, the wrapped item clutched tightly in her hands.

"We don't normally give one another presents," the Guardian of Memories explained softly. "This," she gestured at the small pile of presents, "is because North wanted to make sure this year was special. None of us were sure what to get you, though, so in the end we settled on this. A gift from all of us."

She extended her hand, and Jack took the parcel from her with a questioning look, but his fellow Guardian simply gestured for him to open it. His stomach was twisting itself into knots before he had even fully untied the ribbon, the soft jingle of musical bells and the shape of the object giving him a fair clue as to what lay hidden inside. His instincts were proven correct when the paper fell away to reveal a memory box exactly the same as the one Pitch had used to lure him into his lair what seemed like years ago now. Save for one, small, difference.

"This is…?"

"Your sister's," Tooth offered gently, watching him with only the slightest hint of uncertainty. "You talked about her in your sleep, after we had rescued you from Pitch. I'm not supposed to show you, really, but after everything that happened, I think you deserve this."

Jack stared at the box for a moment longer, before lifting his head to meet Tooth's stare.

"Thank you." The words were a whisper, and he knew his eyes were moist.

Toothiana smiled softly in response, resting her hand briefly on his shoulder. "I'll give you a moment," she said gently. "Come join us when you're ready."

Jack barely noticed her leave, his fingers tracing the pictures engraved on the top of the box in a reverent gesture. Walking forward, he took a seat on the large sofa set to one side of the room, curling his legs beneath him as he took a single, deep breath, then touched the button to unlock the memories contained within.

* * *

Sandy gave up refereeing the ongoing fight between the temperamental Spirit of Summer and the equally irascible Guardian of Hope not long after Tooth and Jack slipped from the room, relatively unnoticed by the celebrating spirits around them. Whilst initially concerned for the possibility of old hurts being rehashed, by the time Mara and Bunny's argument had swung around to the inconvenience of summer heat and its effect on chocolates and '_why don't you put them in the shade then, you dunderhead?_' the Guardian of Dreams felt safe in leaving the two of them to their mutual disparagement.

He had not been the only one to raise doubts over North's plan of a gathering in which the seasonal representatives were included, but the Guardian of Wonder had been adamant that the Big Four had been holding themselves apart from—and perhaps a little above—the other spirits for far too long. It was time for unity again, the big man had determined, and no warning uttered by his fellows had been heeded once the notion was stuck inside his head. Sandy was glad to say the fears North had so adamantly ignored had proved groundless, six months enough time that tempers had cooled and buried resentments had become just that again, but the possibility of still warm embers being fanned into a flame still lingered, and he kept a wary eye on the foursome gathered around the table as he drifted across the room to take a seat beside Aur.

"You need not be so vigilant, Sanderson," the autumn spirit greeted him with a smile. "Mara has given me her word to behave for the duration of this celebration. There will be no outbursts from her." Her gaze shifted, then, to the more than slightly inebriated Ground Hog. "For Chuck, however, I cannot speak."

Sandy smirked slightly at her observation, using his sand images to form his response.

"Yes, indeed," she laughed lightly. "So long as we do not let him near Bunnymund the evening should progress without interruption."

Settling back on the cushions of North's couch, Sandy folded his hands across his stomach and let his eyelids droop, sleepily observing family and friends alike. A soft buzz of wings sounded above him as one of Aur's pixies landed in his hair, and the weight that followed a moment later let him know the others had followed suit.

"Skadi was ever a herald of destruction," Aur uttered softly, seemingly speaking to herself, though Sandy cocked his head slightly to let her know he was listening. "Even before… She always took such relish in driving the fruits of Spring and Fall back into sleep with Winter's vehemence. If there was ever a warning that her destiny would lead her to a fate of darkness, it could be found in her love for winter's cruelty."

Sandy nodded somnolently, and, with a small sigh, the autumn spirit continued.

"Pitch and Skadi lost the Winter War, but I do not believe we were victorious either. The pair of them managed to forge such a rift between us that it has not ever shown signs of healing before now. They found triumph in their loss, but we found very little in our victory."

Cracking an eye open, the Guardian of Dreams chanced a glance at his companion, finding her gaze fixed, not on the table, but instead on the door through which Tooth was just now reemerging. The Guardian of Memories glanced about the room briefly, before her eyes settled on the conversing pair, and she drifted in their direction.

"Tonight is a step in healing that has been a long time in coming, and I do not believe we need to look far to find its source," Aur concluded. "I cannot decide whether it is ironic or fitting that Jackson should be the one to undo the damage Skadi left behind."

"We all had a part in that," Tooth contradicted, having reached them soon enough to hear the end of Aur's statement. "Guardian and Seasonal alike. Jack was the catalyst, and we each had to decide how to react."

"And some reacted better than others." Aur inclined her head briefly, and there was no doubt as to whom she spoke of. "But, ultimately, no matter what purpose drove the Man in the Moon to choose Jackson as a Guardian, he provided the momentum in what has been a stagnant world for far too long. As immortals, I fear we too often forget what it is to be young, and, whilst age lends us a greater knowledge, we tend to lose the wisdom we were bestowed with as children. Jackson is yet a child, but still Guardian and Seasonal both. He has already bridged the gap between your kind and your wards, and I believe he is fully capable of doing the same for the rest of the spirit world."

Sandy was wide awake in a moment at that admission, turning to the autumn spirit in surprise, his movements dislodging the pixies that had settled in to sleep in his dreamsand coated hair.

"Uniting the spirit world?" Tooth frowned. "With all our differences? That seems impossible."

"Improbable, perhaps," Aur conceded. "Yet, somehow, Jack Frost is a name known to almost all our peers. Most have never met him, some have never seen him, and yet he is known to each and every one of them. How many others spirits who are not Guardians can you say the same of? Jackson has made an impression on nearly all our kind, good or bad. He has already taken the first steps towards uniting us."

"Uniting us against _what_, Aur?" Sandy started slightly, having not even noticed when the rest of their party joined their small circle, North and Chuck's eggnog induced joviality suspiciously absent. It was Bunny who had voiced the question, and Bunny who pressed for an answer. "What aren't you guys sharing?"

"Oh, _please_," Mara interjected, and Sandy knew whatever came next would be tinder to the fire. "Just because you high and mighty Guardians deign to invite us to your celebrations this once you think you're entitled to know everything now?"

"_Not_ everything," Bunny snapped back. "Just the things you choose to keep from us despite knowing they could very well end in disaster if they go unchecked. Sound familiar, Ginger?"

"And what about sharing the fact Pitch was loose with a vested interest in seasonal spirits, huh?" the Groundhog leapt to his charge's defence. "Pot, kettle, black, Aster."

"Pitch was defeated," North responded quickly. "Was no need for warning."

"And look how _splendidly_ that ended," Mara growled.

Sandy had risen off the couch by this point, waving his hands in what he knew would be yet another fruitless attempt to cool the tensions without being able to utter a sound, but before the civility of the night could complete its sharp u-turn into past arguments another voice intruded on the increasingly volatile discussion.

"Hey, guys, what did I miss?"

Jack's return was like a bucket of cold water dashed over all their heads, and Sandy watched with interest as almost every one of the involved parties visibly deflated. Only Mara looked set to continue the debate, and she subsided at once when Aur wordlessly touched her arm, shaking her head at Mara's questioning glance.

"What did you miss?" North demanded, excitement starting to brew in his blue eyes. "What did you _miss_? Nothing, Jack, timing is perfect! You just in time to come see big finale."

With that the big man immediately began ushering his friends outside to witness the light show Sandy himself had had a part in designing, effectively brushing the unfinished argument to the side with his usual irrepressible energy. Floating along at the rear of the group, a glance back allowed him to catch the moment when Jack pulled a surprised Tooth into a tight embrace, the gratitude on his face speaking more eloquently than words ever could. Smiling to himself, Sandy turned away, his smile fading but slightly when he realized Aur had never answered Bunny's question. A brief sense of unease swept over him, but he shook it off. Tonight was for celebration, after all. There would be plenty of time to worry on the morrow.

* * *

Settled in the corner, distant from the festivities and the roaring fire, Jack watched the antics of his friends—his _family_—with a small, fond smile. He had taken part in the celebration earlier, before the Seasonals took their leave and returned to their own affairs. He had talked, laughed, and joked with more sincerity than he had ever used in his prior interactions with the Guardians, but now he was content to sit and watch the joyous, familial scene playing out before him. He was content, at peace, for once not struggling to figure out how he fit into all this or fretting over some mistake he had made. It was an odd feeling, but he found he liked it, even folded away in the corner toying with his staff and running his finger repeatedly over the mismatched shard.

It was still a wonder to him that Jamie's belief had healed the shattered rod. He had been so ready to give up. To run away. To protect his family in the only way he knew how. But Jamie… Jamie was something special, and, in hindsight, Jack should have known the boy would never let him go without a fight. That was another nice feeling; the knowledge someone in the world was willing to fight for him, and he allowed himself a moment to bask in the warmth that thought brought him.

"You okay over here, Frosty?"

The gentle question startled him out of his reminiscent thoughts, and he glanced up with a grin as Bunny took a seat beside him. The pair of them were still on new ground when it came to their relationship, their bond an interesting prospect he still did not understand. Bunny had seen him at his worst, in a state far more terrifying to both of them than the other Guardians had witnessed, and that experience had formed something between them that wasn't there before. Something had clicked into placed when Bunny had chosen to comfort him at his lowest point, and Jack hesitantly named this new feeling between them a brotherly one. Jack thought he would like to have a brother. It would make all the teasing and insults and deliberately provocative mischief entirely justifiable.

"Earth calling Jack." Bunny's words reminded him he had yet to give a verbal response. "You in there, Frost?"

There was the lightest hint of concern in the Easter Guardian's tone, another lingering memento of the ordeal they had all been through. Jack was not oblivious to the surreptitious glances both Bunny and the others had been throwing at him ever since his return to their ranks, but, though it had been going on for months now, he did not feel smothered. Instead he felt comfortably cared for, the attention that had so frightened him before now a steadying influence in his life. He wasn't ready for independence just yet, and, whilst he would never have asked the Guardians outright, he was secretly grateful for the way they had closed ranks around him. How they had shattered and rendered void his fears that a single mistake on his part would lead to them abandoning him. For the first time since he had become a Guardian, Jack felt like he _belonged_ with the Big Four, not just as a bolster to their ranks, but as a part of their family.

"Jack?" Bunny prompted again.

"Yeah, I'm okay." He doubted Bunny would take his word for it, but a response was still necessary. He considered briefly throwing in a comment about the Easter Guardian's mothering side, but abandoned the idea, too pleasantly comfortable to start a fight.

"North thought we might have overwhelmed you," Bunny offered, clearly searching for more of a response. "He reckoned we should let you be."

"Who? Me?" He threw the Easter Guardian a flippant grin, before turning back to the entirely homely portrait in front of him. "Yeah, maybe a little," he admitted more seriously. "But in a good way."

Bunny nodded without saying a word, then extended a paw. "Mind if I take a look at that?"

Jack glanced down at his hands and the staff he had unconsciously been toying with all along. He had not let the item out of his grasp since it was restored to his possession, so it surprised him somewhat that he had no compunctions about handing the staff to Bunny. The Pooka handled the stave with a care that fully justified Jack's trust, studying the mismatching shard with interest.

"You really know how to pick 'em, don't you?" he commented at last. "I've been meaning to ask you why you ever singled Jamie out in the first place."

"I don't know." Jack shrugged, watching as Bunny turned the staff over and over in his paws. "I just knew he was special, I guess."

"Special is an understatement," Bunny said. "That kid saved all of us more than once. He's the reason we managed to beat Pitch, both times."

"It's funny, isn't it?" Jack agreed thoughtfully. "The difference a little belief can make."

"Jack, mate." Bunny shook his head slightly. "Belief can save the world. _Has_ saved the world. There's a reason we guard it so fiercely."

"_Maybe you just aren't believing hard enough_…"

The words pinged slightly inside Jack's mind, and he frowned, the thought that flashed through his head fleeting but important.

_"…something that made her believe he could be saved, and the key to doing so lay in his daughter…"_

Why? Why was his subconscious flinging these thoughts at him now? He groped for the answer, a frown working its way across his face.

_"…They could still be out there, somewhere, if you only knew where to look…"_

And then it hit him, like a proverbial brick wall, or that billboard Tooth had collided with in her excitement.

_"…Think of someone! Anyone you care about. Focus on them, and only them…"_

"I could paint this, you know," Bunny was saying, oblivious to Jack's slowly dawning realization. "Make it into a feature. The Guardians' symbol maybe? Whadd'ya think?"

_"…Mother, take me home…"_

"That sounds great, Bunny," Jack answered, sincere, but with only half his mind on the topic at hand. "But can I have it back for now?"

"Well, sure…" Bunny began, stopping in surprise when Jack all but snatched the staff from his hand.

"Thanks," Jack muttered, preoccupied and headed for the window.

"Oy!" Behind him, Bunny leapt to his feet, confusion ringing in his voice. "Where are you _going_?"

"I'll be back in a jiffy!" Jack promised, and a moment later he was out the window and being borne away on the Wind.

* * *

Pitch broke the surface with a ragged gasp, frigid water streaming from his hair and clothes as he dragged himself, hand over hand, up the snow-laden bank. It took a momentous amount of effort, and was a sure sign of how weakened he was after his long imprisonment, but eventually he had pulled himself far enough from the hole through which he escaped to be beyond the fear of tumbling back within, though even out of the water the stiff breeze swirling along the lake's edge made his situation most uncomfortable. For a moment, then, he lay still, breathing in sharp, uneven gulps of air, and hoping with all his might that there was no one nearby to witness his humiliation.

He had been beaten.

By a _child_.

How that thought rankled, all the more so because it was certainly not the first time such an advent had occurred. Nightlight, who had won himself eternal recognition for his part in the fight to protect the infant Tsar Lunanoff, had been considered a child at the time of his victory, but at least then Pitch had been able to insure his nemesis suffered with him. With the frost child, that opportunity had slipped through his clenched fingers as surely as melted ice, and he had endured his imprisonment alone. A shudder wracked his frame at the mere thought, for if there was one thing the many beings that _were_ Pitch feared, it was being sealed again in a place from which they could not escape.

It had been a mistake to allow Jack Frost to continue living, an act of sentimentality born from a part of him that should have died a long time ago. A part he _believed_ he had killed. The part that saw pieces of his own child in the winter spirit, in both the similarities and differences Jack bore to his predecessor. He had been able to twist that sentiment, that call of familiarity to his own devious purposes, but he had neglected to go far enough, and now he was paying the price. Frost had won because he allowed himself to lose focus. It was an error of judgment he did not intend to make again.

"You done hacking lake water?"

The voice startled him, recognition sending an uncomfortable jolt of surprise through his frame. He attempted to rear to his feet, but the grace of the gesture was lost as he stumbled, his limbs still wobbly, though he could assuage his smarting pride with the knowledge the glare he levelled now upon the spirit standing before him did not waver in the slightest.

"_Frost_." The word was a curse in and of itself. He _made_ it so. "To what do I owe the _immense_ displeasure?"

"You should be thanking me," Jack retorted boldly, leaning on his reforged staff and looking for as if he didn't have a care in the world. "If it weren't for me, you'd still be enjoying all the comforts of your private little igloo."

"If you think rescuing me from a prison of your own devising changes anything, then you are bound for disappointment. I would have escaped sooner or later on my own."

"And then you would have come back to rain vengeance down on the Guardians' world, blah, blah, blah, generic evil speech, repetitive bad guy butt kicking, back to square one. That's how it normally goes, right?"

Pitch's eyes narrowed as he contemplated simply dropping Frost where he stood. He hesitated, though, tracing the moonbeam that nipped protectively at the winter spirit's heels. Jack was not so alone as he seemed, then, but was it merely the Man in the Moon who had accompanied him on whatever quest led him to returning to this lake, or were the other Guardians concealed in the woods around them, just waiting for the right moment to strike? He was not yet strong enough to risk encountering them all at once, so he held his ground, settling for pinning Jack with a look of utter disdain instead.

"I will win eventually."

"You can keep telling yourself that as long as you want, that doesn't mean it's ever going to happen," Jack answered smoothly, no derision in the words, their tone one of simple fact. "Or you can stop being so utterly feeble and start fighting the real battle."

"The _real_ battle?"

Had Frost taken leave of his senses? Had Pitch done more damage than he realized? It was not an entirely unappealing thought, even as he realized how unlikely it was.

"Yes, the real battle." Jack nodded. "Except, I wasn't talking to you, Pitch."

Maybe the boy really _was_ insane, because, moonbeam or not, there was no one but the two of them within hearing distance.

"I am sure the forest animals will find your little speech most inspiring," he sneered. "But I do not have the time to waste pandering to your fancies. Go find someone else to bother, Frost. That is, if any of them will _have_ you."

Without waiting to see what reaction, if any, his words invoked, Pitch spun on his heel, ignoring the way his vision swam disarmingly as he marched away across the snow.

"Seraphina."

That single word was like a dagger, driven into his non-existent heart and twisted with the most malicious cruelty. It stopped him in his tracks with an ease that nothing else could have matched, and he stood, frozen, unable to move even a single muscle as a part of him that had not surfaced for _years_ stirred suddenly back to life in a shock of pain and regret.

"That was her name," Jack continued quietly. "Seraphina. Your _daughter_."

"Was her name," he snarled, spinning back around in a fit of fury that easily quenched that stirring remnant. "_Was_, because of your precious Guardians!"

"You don't know that," Jack replied placidly.

"I _do_ know that!" he roared, taking a step forward, forgetting his weakness as rage overthrew all else.

"No," the winter spirit contradicted. "No, you don't. And that's what finished it, isn't it? That's what made General Kozmotis Pitchiner finally _stop_ fighting you. Because he _didn't _know. Was it an accident that killed her, Pitch, or did you do it as a means of fully suppressing your better half?"

Shock rippled through him, but it was deep and distant, and his harsh laughter very nearly drowned it.

"Is that why you are here?" he demanded coldly, ignoring the growing sense of unease that was not wholly his own. "You think you can _redeem_ me?"

"_I_ can't," Jack said simply, straightening up and giving his staff a slight whirl.

Pitch tensed, ready for the moment when the conversation ended and the true battle began, but, before he could do more than brace himself, Jack had swivelled his rod around so that he was grasping it by its crook, the handle extended well within Pitch's reach.

"Take it," he dared.

Eyeing the staff with a distrustful glare, Pitch levelled a piercing stare at the winter spirit. "Do you take me for a fool?"

"What's the matter?" Jack asked, tilting his head to the side slightly. "Afraid it's a trick? Isn't that more your style?"

Pitch considered the proffered weapon for a moment longer, his eyes narrowed, before reaching out and deftly ripping it from Jack's hands. The winter spirit took a step back, and Pitch witnessed just the barest flicker of concern in Jack's eyes before his confidence reasserted itself.

"Now what, Frost?" he mocked his adversary. "Did you enjoy the experience so much the first time around you wish to repeat it?"

"Go ahead." Jack gave his head a sharp nod. "Try to break it. I _dare_ you."

Suspicion warred with the desire to wipe that irritating self-confidence away in one, fell swoop. It had to be a trick, he was certain. There was no way Jack would hand his precious staff over to the very person who had all but destroyed his life when the item had last been in their possession. No, Frost was up to something, but not even Pitch's wicked intelligence could discern what. Keeping one eye on the spirit before him, Pitch summoned what remained of his dark powers in the wake of his crushing defeat, the remnants of corrupted energy swirling into being as he focussed all his might on rending the wooden rod in two. To his dismay his powers simply rebounded off the object, the staff flying from his hands with a crackle of frosted denial to land in the snow where it rested innocuously, looking for all the world like nothing more than another piece of wood.

Jack bent to retrieve it, the item coming to life where his hands touched it as it always had, and Pitch, still reeling from the effects of his own powers rebounding against him, allowed his sleek veneer to slip long enough for a single statement to escape him.

"You _knew_ that would happen."

"No, I didn't." Jack shrugged, grasping the staff in one hand and running his other over the bend. That was where the shard Pitch had destroyed had once rested, another fragment now in its place. "I simply _believed_ that you would not be able to break it, because it was reforged _by_ belief, and I was right."

"And what purpose did that little exercise serve?" he asked derisively. "Besides proving that you enjoy gloating as much as the next spirit."

"I didn't come here to gloat." Jack frowned, looking genuinely upset by the suggestion. "And that wasn't what giving you the staff was about. I wanted to prove a point."

"Indeed." He was intrigued despite himself, and waved a hand airily as he added, "Do tell."

"I wanted to show you the power of belief," Jack answered readily. "I wanted you to _see_ what it can do. And I wanted you to remember that there was once a young girl who believed in you, who believed in her _father_, and who still believes enough that she has managed to cling to existence despite everything just to try and save you."

Something pulsed in his chest, hard and fast and thick with both trepidation and longing. He crushed it beneath the weight of darkness that resided inside of him, staring Frost down with utter disdain.

"Seraphina is dead."

"She isn't," was the firm reply. "There's a reason why the seasonals address the Wind as 'Mother'."

The pulse was stronger this time, a lingering feeling that was not so easily quelled, though he hid any outer sign that it even existed. It had a name, he knew, this intrusive emotion Frost had awakened, but he was loath to even think it, let alone utter it aloud.

"So a small piece of her essence survives." He played down what Jack had no doubt intended to be a bombshell. "Without a voice, most likely without even a mind. If it was belief that brought her to such a state of existence, then I _pity_ her."

"You don't pity anyone," Jack stated flatly. "At least, Pitch Black doesn't. I don't know about Kozmotis Pitchiner. I've never had the chance to meet him."

"And you never will," Pitch retorted harshly, ignoring the faintest echo of protest from within. It had been a long time since the original inhabitant of his host had dared to use his voice, and Pitch was determined that that should not change now. "That man is dead."

"He is no more dead than his daughter," came Jack's rebuffal. "I'm not here to gloat, Pitch, I'm here to _warn_ you. I've seen the power of belief. I've seen it go up against impossible odds and win. I've seen it hold friends together when everything in the world is determined to rip them apart. I've seen it repair the irreparable. I've seen it do the impossible. And I believe, with every shred of faith I have, that it can bring back the good man—the _hero_—that you've possessed like a puppet on a string. Your days are numbered, Boogeyman, someone is about to shine a light on your shadows."

Pitch struggled to come up with an apt response, his normally fluent tongue deserting him as he sought the stinging rejoinder that would silence Frost forever. Jack never gave him the chance to find it. Having delivered his message the winter spirit took several steps back before extending his arms to the side, allowing the Wind to lift him and throw him bodily through the air, carrying him swiftly from sight. Pitch tried to ignore the brief tendril of air that whispered along his cheek like a phantom touch, swatting it away like the nuisance it was. But he was not the only one to have felt that fond caress, and, even as he turned in a flurry of black cloaks to skulk back into hiding, he put a name to the feeling that was swelling slowly but surely inside of his dark shell.

_Hope_.


End file.
